Portainer Templates logo

Portainer Templates

Mastodon (stack) Mastodon (stack)

Social

Mastodon is a free, open-source social network server based on ActivityPub where users can follow friends and discover new ones..
Source: https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon

Source details

Repo: mastodon/mastodon
Stars: 50.3k
Forks: 8k
Language: Ruby
License: AGPL-3.0
Latest: v4.7.2 · 14 days ago
Updated: 9 minutes ago
Website: joinmastodon.org/

Configuration

Type
Compose
Platform
linux
Image
lscr.io/linuxserver/mastodon:latest
Ports
80:80443:443
Volumes
/config : /portainer/Files/AppData/Config/mastodon
Env vars
PUID=1000PGID=1000TZ=Europe/AthensLOCAL_DOMAIN=example.comREDIS_HOST=redisREDIS_PORT=6379DB_HOST=dbDB_USER=mastodonDB_NAME=mastodonDB_PASS=mastodonDB_PORT=5432ES_ENABLED=falseSECRET_KEY_BASE=OTP_SECRET=VAPID_PRIVATE_KEY=VAPID_PUBLIC_KEY=SMTP_SERVER=mail.example.comSMTP_PORT=25SMTP_LOGIN=SMTP_PASSWORD=SMTP_FROM_ADDRESS=notifications@example.comS3_ENABLED=falseWEB_DOMAIN=mastodon.example.comES_HOST=esES_PORT=9200ES_USER=elasticES_PASS=elasticS3_BUCKET=AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=S3_ALIAS_HOST=SIDEKIQ_ONLY=falseSIDEKIQ_QUEUE=SIDEKIQ_DEFAULT=falseSIDEKIQ_THREADS=5DB_POOL=5
Restart
unless-stopped
Source
Repo

Template by xneo1·Source

Standalone Install

Select an install method, to see config/commands for deploying Mastodon (stack)

Installation method

Install on Portainer

Import all app templates into your Portainer instance, for easy 1-click deploys

  1. Ensure both Docker and Portainer are installed, and up-to-date
  2. Log into your Portainer web UI
  3. Under Settings → App Templates, paste the below URL
  4. Head to Home → App Templates, and the list of apps will show up
  5. Select Mastodon (stack), fill in any config options, and hit Deploy

Template Import URL

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Lissy93/portainer-templates/main/templates.json
Show Me demo
Original stackfile

The compose file this template deploys, straight from its repo:

services:
  mastodon:
    image: lscr.io/linuxserver/mastodon:latest
    container_name: mastodon
    environment:
      - PUID=1000
      - PGID=1000
      - TZ=Europe/Athens
      - LOCAL_DOMAIN=example.com
      - REDIS_HOST=redis
      - REDIS_PORT=6379
      - DB_HOST=db
      - DB_USER=mastodon
      - DB_NAME=mastodon
      - DB_PASS=mastodon
      - DB_PORT=5432
      - ES_ENABLED=false
      - SECRET_KEY_BASE=
      - OTP_SECRET=
      - VAPID_PRIVATE_KEY=
      - VAPID_PUBLIC_KEY=
      - SMTP_SERVER=mail.example.com
      - SMTP_PORT=25
      - SMTP_LOGIN=
      - SMTP_PASSWORD=
      - SMTP_FROM_ADDRESS=notifications@example.com
      - S3_ENABLED=false
      - WEB_DOMAIN=mastodon.example.com #optional
      - ES_HOST=es #optional
      - ES_PORT=9200 #optional
      - ES_USER=elastic #optional
      - ES_PASS=elastic #optional
      - S3_BUCKET= #optional
      - AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID= #optional
      - AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY= #optional
      - S3_ALIAS_HOST= #optional
      - SIDEKIQ_ONLY=false #optional
      - SIDEKIQ_QUEUE= #optional
      - SIDEKIQ_DEFAULT=false #optional
      - SIDEKIQ_THREADS=5 #optional
      - DB_POOL=5 #optional
    volumes:
      - /portainer/Files/AppData/Config/mastodon:/config
    ports:
      - 80:80
      - 443:443
    restart: unless-stopped

Or deploy it directly from the source:

git clone https://github.com/xneo1/portainer_templates
cd portainer_templates
docker compose -f Template/Stack/mastodon.yml up -d

More install options in our documentation, or see mastodon/mastodon for app-specific guidance.

!NOTE Want to learn more about Mastodon? Click below to find out more in a video.

<img alt="Mastodon hero image" src="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mastodon/mastodon/HEAD/docs/hero-nodes.gif" />


<img src="https://img.shields.io/github/release/mastodon/mastodon.svg" alt="Release" /></a>
<img src="https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/actions/workflows/test-ruby.yml/badge.svg" alt="Ruby Testing" /></a>
<img src="https://d322cqt584bo4o.cloudfront.net/mastodon/localized.svg" alt="Crowdin" /></a>


Mastodon is a free, open-source social network server based on ActivityPub where users can follow friends and discover new ones. On Mastodon, users can publish anything they want: links, pictures, text, and video. All Mastodon servers are interoperable as a federated network (users on one server can seamlessly communicate with users from another one, including non-Mastodon software that implements ActivityPub!)

Navigation

- View sponsors

Features


Part of the Fediverse. Based on open standards, with no vendor lock-in. - the network goes beyond just Mastodon; anything that implements ActivityPub is part of a broader social network known as the Fediverse. You can follow and interact with users on other servers (including those running different software), and they can follow you back.
Real-time, chronological timeline updates - updates of people you're following appear in real-time in the UI.
Media attachments - upload and view images and videos attached to the updates. Videos with no audio track are treated like animated GIFs; normal videos loop continuously.
Safety and moderation tools - Mastodon includes private posts, locked accounts, phrase filtering, muting, blocking, and many other features, along with a reporting and moderation system.
OAuth2 and a straightforward REST API - Mastodon acts as an OAuth2 provider, and third party apps can use the REST and Streaming APIs. This results in a rich app ecosystem with a variety of choices!

Deployment

Tech stack

  • Ruby on Rails powers the REST API and other web pages.
  • PostgreSQL is the main database.
  • Redis and Sidekiq are used for caching and queueing.
  • Node.js powers the streaming API.
  • React.js and Redux are used for the dynamic parts of the interface.
  • BrowserStack supports testing on real devices and browsers. (This project is tested with BrowserStack)
  • Chromatic provides visual regression testing. (This project is tested with Chromatic)

Requirements

  • Ruby 3.3+
  • PostgreSQL 14+
  • Redis 7.0+
  • Node.js 22+
  • FFmpeg 5.1+

This repository includes deployment configurations for Docker and docker-compose, as well as for other environments like Heroku and Scalingo. For Helm charts, reference the mastodon/chart repository. A standalone installation guide is available in the main documentation.

Contributing

Mastodon is free, open-source software licensed under AGPLv3. We welcome contributions and help from anyone who wants to improve the project.
You should read the overall CONTRIBUTING guide, which covers our development processes.
You should also read and understand the CODE OF CONDUCT that enables us to maintain a welcoming and inclusive community. Collaboration begins with mutual respect and understanding.
You can learn about setting up a development environment in the DEVELOPMENT documentation.
If you would like to help with translations 🌐 you can do so on Crowdin.

LICENSE

Copyright (c) 2016-2026 Eugen Rochko (+ mastodon authors)
Licensed under GNU Affero General Public License as stated in the LICENSE:
Copyright (c) 2016-2026 Eugen Rochko & other Mastodon contributors

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
the terms of the GNU Affero General Public License as published by the Free
Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any
later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT
ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS
FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU Affero General Public License for more
details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU Affero General Public License along
with this program. If not, see https://www.gnu.org/licenses/

Serve Mastodon (stack) on your own domain behind Caddy, Nginx or Traefik. Fill in your domain and copy the result. It's a starting point, some apps need their own base URL or extra headers set too.

Proxying mastodon-stack.example.com to http://mastodon:80

Add this to your Caddyfile

mastodon-stack.example.com {
	reverse_proxy http://mastodon:80
}

Check the logs first

Nine times out of ten the logs tell you exactly what went wrong.

  • In Portainer, go to Containers, click the container, then Logs. Or run docker logs <container>
  • Exit codes help too: 137 means killed, usually out of memory. 126 or 127 means the command inside the image is broken.

Port already in use

If deployment fails with "Bind for 0.0.0.0:80 failed: port is already allocated", something else on your server is using that port.

  • Find what's using it: sudo ss -tlnp | grep :80
  • Stop the other service, or pick a different host port. In 80:80 only the left number is yours to change, the right one belongs to the app.

Running but the page won't load

The container is up but nothing appears in your browser.

  • Use your server's real IP: http://your-server-ip:80. The 0.0.0.0 link Portainer shows isn't a real address.
  • Give it a minute after first deploy, mastodon can take a while to initialise.
  • Make sure your firewall allows the port, e.g. sudo ufw allow 80

Permission denied on volumes

If the logs show "permission denied", the app can't write to its data folder on the host.

  • Fix the ownership: sudo chown -R 1000:1000 /portainer/Files/AppData/Config/mastodon
  • Or set the PUID and PGID variables (defaults 1000:1000) to match your own user, found with id $USER

Image won't pull

Test the pull directly on the host: docker pull lscr.io/linuxserver/mastodon:latest

  • "manifest unknown" means the tag no longer exists. This template uses latest, so try pinning a specific version instead.
  • "toomanyrequests" is the Docker Hub rate limit. Log in with docker login to raise it.
  • "no space left on device" means a full disk. Reclaim space with docker system prune

"exec format error"

This means the image was built for a different CPU architecture than your server.

  • Check yours with uname -m: x86_64 is amd64, aarch64 is arm64. Raspberry Pi and other ARM boards are the usual culprits.

Container keeps restarting

The unless-stopped restart policy relaunches the app after every crash, so the real error can scroll past.

  • Check the logs right after a restart, the last few lines before it died are the useful ones.
  • Get the exit code with docker inspect <container> --format '{{.State.ExitCode}}'
  • Still stuck? Redeploy once with the restart policy set to no so the failure stays visible.

Required settings are blank

SECRET_KEY_BASE, OTP_SECRET, VAPID_PRIVATE_KEY, VAPID_PUBLIC_KEY, SMTP_LOGIN, SMTP_PASSWORD, S3_BUCKET, AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID, AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY, S3_ALIAS_HOST, SIDEKIQ_QUEUE have no default value, and mastodon may crash or misbehave if left empty.

  • Fill them in on the deploy screen before hitting deploy.

Stack won't deploy

Compose stacks fail fast on small mistakes, and Portainer shows the reason just above the editor.

  • YAML only accepts spaces for indentation, a single tab breaks the whole file.

Raise an issue

Found something which isn't working as it should? Here's how to report it.

A Compose stack

Mastodon (stack) is a Compose stack, a set of containers defined in one file and brought up together by Portainer, then started and stopped as a single app.

The app image

An image is the app packed up ready to go, everything Mastodon (stack) needs bundled into one download. This template pulls lscr.io/linuxserver/mastodon:latest, which Docker fetches once and then starts your own copy from.

Where the image comes from

Docker pulls its images from registries, public libraries of ready-built apps. Mastodon (stack)'s comes from LinuxServer's registry, published by linuxserver.

Version tags

The bit after the colon in the image name is the version tag. Here it's latest, which always points at the newest build, so a redeploy can bump you to a newer release without you asking. Pin a specific tag if you would rather stay on one version.

Ports

A port is the door the app answers on. A mapping like 80:80 means it's reachable on port 80 of your server, where the left number is yours to change and the right one belongs to the app. Once it's running, open http://your-server-ip:80 in a browser. It opens:

  • 80:80, likely the web interface
  • 443:443, likely the web interface

Volumes

A volume is where Mastodon (stack) keeps its files so they survive an update or a restart. Without one, anything it saves would sit inside the container and vanish the moment it's recreated. This template mounts:

  • /config from /portainer/Files/AppData/Config/mastodon on the host

Environment variables

Environment variables are the settings you hand over when you deploy, things like a password or a timezone. Mastodon (stack) takes 36 of them, and 11 need a value before it'll start properly:

  • PUID, defaults to 1000
  • PGID, defaults to 1000
  • TZ, defaults to Europe/Athens
  • LOCAL_DOMAIN, defaults to example.com
  • REDIS_HOST, defaults to redis
  • REDIS_PORT, defaults to 6379
  • DB_HOST, defaults to db
  • DB_USER, defaults to mastodon
  • DB_NAME, defaults to mastodon
  • DB_PASS, defaults to mastodon
  • DB_PORT, defaults to 5432
  • ES_ENABLED, defaults to false
  • SECRET_KEY_BASE, needs a value
  • OTP_SECRET, needs a value
  • VAPID_PRIVATE_KEY, needs a value
  • VAPID_PUBLIC_KEY, needs a value
  • SMTP_SERVER, defaults to mail.example.com
  • SMTP_PORT, defaults to 25
  • SMTP_LOGIN, needs a value
  • SMTP_PASSWORD, needs a value
  • SMTP_FROM_ADDRESS, defaults to notifications@example.com
  • S3_ENABLED, defaults to false
  • WEB_DOMAIN, defaults to mastodon.example.com
  • ES_HOST, defaults to es
  • ES_PORT, defaults to 9200
  • ES_USER, defaults to elastic
  • ES_PASS, defaults to elastic
  • S3_BUCKET, needs a value
  • AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID, needs a value
  • AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY, needs a value
  • S3_ALIAS_HOST, needs a value
  • SIDEKIQ_ONLY, defaults to false
  • SIDEKIQ_QUEUE, needs a value
  • SIDEKIQ_DEFAULT, defaults to false
  • SIDEKIQ_THREADS, defaults to 5
  • DB_POOL, defaults to 5

Restart policy

The restart policy here is unless-stopped, so Docker restarts Mastodon (stack) after a crash or reboot, but leaves it off when you stop it on purpose. You can change this on the deploy screen. The choices are no (never restart), on-failure (only after a crash), unless-stopped (restart unless you stop it), and always (bring it back no matter what).

Users and permissions

The PUID and PGID settings tell it which user and group to act as on your host. Point them at your own account (find yours with id $USER) so the files it writes into your mounted folders come out owned by you rather than root.

Networking

Nothing custom is set, so Mastodon (stack) sits on Docker's default bridge network: its own private space that reaches the outside world only through the ports it publishes.

Container name

Once it's deployed, Portainer names the container mastodon. That's what you'll spot in the containers list and use in commands like docker logs mastodon.

Platform

The platform is linux, the kind of system the container is built to run on. Docker and Portainer handle this on a normal Linux server.

Open source license

Mastodon (stack) is open source, released under the AGPL-3.0 license. In plain terms the code is out in the open, so you're free to run it and change it to fit what you need.

Portainer app templates

Zooming out, this whole page comes from a Portainer app template: a short recipe telling Portainer how to set Mastodon (stack) up. Add the template list to Portainer once, then deploying Mastodon (stack) is a click rather than a wall of config.