# Bitnami Secure Image for NATS

> NATS is an open source, lightweight and high-performance messaging system. It is ideal for distributed systems and supports modern cloud architectures and pub-sub, request-reply and queuing models.

[Overview of NATS](https://nats.io/)
Trademarks: This software listing is packaged by Bitnami. The respective trademarks mentioned in the offering are owned by the respective companies, and use of them does not imply any affiliation or endorsement.

## TL;DR

Use this quick command to run the container.

```console
docker run -it --name nats bitnami/nats:latest
```

## Why use Bitnami Secure Images?

Those are hardened, minimal CVE images built and maintained by Bitnami. Bitnami Secure Images are based on the cloud-optimized, security-hardened enterprise [OS Photon Linux](https://vmware.github.io/photon/). Why choose BSI images?

- Hardened secure images of popular open source software with Near-Zero Vulnerabilities
- Vulnerability Triage & Prioritization with VEX Statements, KEV and EPSS Scores
- Compliance focus with FIPS, STIG, and air-gap options, including secure bill of materials (SBOM)
- Software supply chain provenance attestation through in-toto
- First class support for the internet’s favorite Helm charts

Each image comes with valuable security metadata. You can view the metadata in [our public catalog here](https://app-catalog.vmware.com/bitnami/apps). Note: Some data is only available with [commercial subscriptions to BSI](https://bitnami.com/).

![Alt text](https://github.com/bitnami/containers/blob/main/BSI%20UI%201.png?raw=true "Application details")
![Alt text](https://github.com/bitnami/containers/blob/main/BSI%20UI%202.png?raw=true "Packaging report")

If you are looking for our previous generation of images based on Debian Linux, please see the [Bitnami Legacy registry](https://hub.docker.com/u/bitnamilegacy).

## How to deploy NATS in Kubernetes

Deploying Bitnami applications as Helm Charts is the easiest way to get started with our applications on Kubernetes. Read more about the installation in the [Bitnami NATS Chart GitHub repository](https://github.com/bitnami/charts/tree/master/bitnami/nats).

## Why use a non-root container?

Non-root container images add an extra layer of security and are generally recommended for production environments. However, because they run as a non-root user, privileged tasks are typically off-limits. Learn more about non-root containers [in our docs](https://techdocs.broadcom.com/us/en/vmware-tanzu/application-catalog/tanzu-application-catalog/services/tac-doc/apps-tutorials-work-with-non-root-containers-index.html).

## Supported tags and respective `Dockerfile` links

Learn more about the Bitnami tagging policy and the difference between rolling tags and immutable tags [in our documentation page](https://techdocs.broadcom.com/us/en/vmware-tanzu/application-catalog/tanzu-application-catalog/services/tac-doc/apps-tutorials-understand-rolling-tags-containers-index.html).

## Get this image

The recommended way to get the Bitnami NATS Docker Image is to pull the prebuilt image from the [Docker Hub Registry](https://hub.docker.com/r/bitnami/nats).

```console
docker pull bitnami/nats:latest
```

To use a specific version, you can pull a versioned tag. You can view the
[list of available versions](https://hub.docker.com/r/bitnami/nats/tags/)
in the Docker Hub Registry.

```console
docker pull bitnami/nats:[TAG]
```

If you wish, you can also build the image yourself by cloning the repository, changing to the directory containing the Dockerfile and executing the `docker build` command. Remember to replace the `APP`, `VERSION` and `OPERATING-SYSTEM` path placeholders in the example command below with the correct values.

```console
git clone https://github.com/bitnami/containers.git
cd bitnami/APP/VERSION/OPERATING-SYSTEM
docker build -t bitnami/APP:latest .
```

## Using `docker-compose.yaml`

Please be aware this file has not undergone internal testing. Consequently, we advise its use exclusively for development or testing purposes. For production-ready deployments, we highly recommend utilizing its associated [Bitnami Helm chart](https://github.com/bitnami/charts/tree/main/bitnami/nats).

## Connecting to other containers

Using [Docker container networking](https://docs.docker.com/engine/userguide/networking/), a NATS server running inside a container can easily be accessed by your application containers using a NATS client.

Containers attached to the same network can communicate with each other using the container name as the host name.

### Using the command line

In this example, we will create a NATS client instance that will connect to the server instance that is running on the same docker network as the client.

1. Create a network

    ```console
    docker network create app-tier --driver bridge
    ```

2. Launch the NATS server instance

    Use the `--network app-tier` argument to the `docker run` command to attach the NATS container to the `app-tier` network.

    ```console
    docker run -d --name nats-server \
        --network app-tier \
        --publish 4222:4222 \
        --publish 6222:6222 \
        --publish 8222:8222 \
        --volume /path/to/nats-server.conf:/etc/nats-server.conf:ro \
        bitnami/nats:latest -c /etc/nats-server.conf
    ```

3. Launch your NATS client instance

You can create a NATS client instance as shown below:

```console
docker run -it --rm \
    --network app-tier \
    --volume /path/to/your/workspace:/go \
    bitnami/natscli -s nats://nats-server:4222 <your-nats-command>
```

### Using a Docker Compose file

When not specified, Docker Compose automatically sets up a new network and attaches all deployed services to that network. However, we will explicitly define a new `bridge` network named `app-tier`. In this example we assume that you want to connect to the NATS server from your own custom application image which is identified in the following snippet by the service name `myapp`.

```yaml
version: '2'

networks:
  app-tier:
    driver: bridge

services:
  nats:
    image: bitnami/nats:latest
    ports:
      - 4222:4222
      - 6222:6222
      - 8222:8222
    networks:
      - app-tier
    volumes:
      - /path/to/nats-server.conf:/etc/nats-server.conf:ro
  myapp:
    image: YOUR_APPLICATION_IMAGE
    networks:
      - app-tier
```

> **Important** 
> 
> 1. Update the `YOUR_APPLICATION_IMAGE` placeholder in the above snippet with your application image. 
> 2. In your application container, use the host name `nats` to connect to the NATS server.

Launch the containers using:

```console
docker-compose up -d
```

## Configuration

The following sections describe how to run commands and where to find further documentation.

### Running commands

To run commands inside this container you can use `docker run`, for example to execute `nats-server -c nats-server.cfg` you can follow the example below:

```console
docker run -d --name nats-server -p 4222:4222 -p 6222:6222 -p 8222:8222 \
  --volume /path/to/nats-server.conf:/etc/nats-server.conf:ro \
  bitnami/nats:latest -c /etc/nats-server.conf
```

### Additional documentation

For additional documentation, please check [NATS documentation](https://docs.nats.io/).

## Notable changes

The following subsections describe notable changes.

### 2.10.24-debian-12-r3

- This image revision dramatically reduces the image given it removes the existing OS distribution. Instead, it simply includes the NATS binary on top of a scratch base image.

### 2.6.4-debian-10-r14

- The configuration logic is now based on Bash scripts in the *rootfs/* folder.

## License

Copyright &copy; 2026 Broadcom. The term "Broadcom" refers to Broadcom Inc. and/or its subsidiaries.

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
You may obtain a copy of the License at

<http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0>

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
limitations under the License.
