moby/docs/reference/commandline/exec.md

exec

Usage: docker exec [OPTIONS] CONTAINER COMMAND [ARG...]

Run a command in a running container

  -d, --detach               Detached mode: run command in the background
  --detach-keys              Specify the escape key sequence used to detach a container
  --help                     Print usage
  -i, --interactive          Keep STDIN open even if not attached
  --privileged               Give extended Linux capabilities to the command
  -t, --tty                  Allocate a pseudo-TTY
  -u, --user=                Username or UID (format: <name|uid>[:<group|gid>])

The docker exec command runs a new command in a running container.

The command started using docker exec only runs while the container's primary process (PID 1) is running, and it is not restarted if the container is restarted.

If the container is paused, then the docker exec command will fail with an error:

$ docker pause test
test
$ docker ps
CONTAINER ID        IMAGE               COMMAND             CREATED             STATUS                   PORTS               NAMES
1ae3b36715d2        ubuntu:latest       "bash"              17 seconds ago      Up 16 seconds (Paused)                       test
$ docker exec test ls
FATA[0000] Error response from daemon: Container test is paused, unpause the container before exec
$ echo $?
1

Examples

$ docker run --name ubuntu_bash --rm -i -t ubuntu bash

This will create a container named ubuntu_bash and start a Bash session.

$ docker exec -d ubuntu_bash touch /tmp/execWorks

This will create a new file /tmp/execWorks inside the running container ubuntu_bash, in the background.

$ docker exec -it ubuntu_bash bash

This will create a new Bash session in the container ubuntu_bash.