Apple Containerization 1.3.1 · Native macOS

Containers on
Apple Silicon.

The Docker Desktop replacement for macOS. Native SwiftUI. Hardware-level isolation. Sub-second boot. Open source forever.

macOS 26+ Tahoe M1 / M2 / M3 / M4 Apache 2.0

Download for Mac ↓ Take the tour →

Keg system dashboard in dark mode showing system status for Apple Containerization 1.3.1, CPU, memory, storage and API latency metrics, four running services, and disk usage — Fig. 01 — System dashboard, Keg for macOS SwiftUI · Virtualization.framework

618ms

Container Start

55ms

Exec Latency

69MB

Idle Memory

437

Tests Passing

Everything you need.

Containers, images, networks, volumes, builds, Compose, Kubernetes — plus guided onboarding, a health score, port dashboard, embedded terminal, dev containers, an on-device agent, and a companion CLI. All native. All fast.

No. 01Boot

Sub-second Boot

618ms average container start. No daemon warmup, no shared VM spin-up. Each container boots its own micro-VM in under a second — 50× faster than Docker Desktop's cold start.

No. 02Isolation

Hardware Isolation

Per-container VMs via Virtualization.framework. Real hardware boundaries, not namespace tricks.

No. 03Footprint

69MB Idle

Docker Desktop idles at 500MB to 2GB. Keg gives you your RAM back.

No. 04Compat

Docker API

Full Engine API on a Unix socket at ~/.keg/docker.sock. docker ps, docker run, docker compose. It all works.

No. 05Stacks

Compose Orchestration

Dependency-ordered bring-up, per-service output, env vars, volumes, networks. Your compose files, zero changes.

No. 06Cluster

Kubernetes

One-click K8s cluster. kindest/node + kubeadm. kubectl ready in 90 seconds.

No. 07Health

Health Score

A single 0–100 score across every container, with per-container memory and CPU signals. Spot the one that needs attention at a glance.

No. 08Ports

Ports Dashboard

Every published port across every container in one table, with one-click localhost URLs. No more hunting for what bound 8080.

No. 09Tooling

Terminal & Dev Containers

Embedded shell with the container CLI wired in, merged multi-container log streams, and .devcontainer project support built in.

No. 10License

Open Source

Apache 2.0, free forever. No seat licenses, no feature gates, no telemetry.

No. 11Onboarding

Grows With You

Three experience levels — Getting Started, Comfortable, Full Control — with first-run quick starts (a 5-second demo, a web server) and inline help on every section.

No. 12Design

Plain Language, Labeled Actions

Every toolbar action carries its name, every disabled button explains itself, and status lives next to the thing it describes. You should never have to guess.

No. 13Agent

Cooper, the Built-in Agent

A built-in agent that answers questions and acts on your containers, images, and Compose stacks. It prefers Apple's on-device model — no account, nothing leaves the machine — and when Apple Intelligence is off or unavailable, Cooper runs on any OpenAI-compatible model instead: OpenAI, OpenRouter, Groq, or a fully local Ollama. Your API key never leaves the Mac's Keychain, and destructive actions need your approval in every mode.

No. 14CLI

keg Companion CLI

A terminal client installed straight from the app: ps, images, logs, exec, start/stop, doctor diagnostics — and keg:// deep links that open the app on the right section. No docker CLI required.

The grand tour.

Twelve real screens from the shipping app — light and dark mode, nothing mocked. A live three-service Compose stack, a cache container, and real logs.

Fig. 02 — First run: pick an experience level welcome sheet

Keg welcome sheet asking How do you want to use Keg? with three experience level cards — Getting Started, Comfortable and Full Control — plus one-click quick starts

getting started → full control

Fig. 03 — Container list dark mode

Container list in dark mode showing four running containers — shop-db-1, shop-api-1, cache and shop-web-1 — with image, status, IP, ports, CPU and memory columns

4 running · live stats

Fig. 04 — Compose, dependency-ordered light mode

3 of 3 services running

Fig. 05 — Container inspector light mode

Container inspector for shop-web-1 showing memory, network and block I/O usage, image, network address, published port 8080:80, resources and process configuration

inspector · shop-web-1

Fig. 06 — Image library light mode

Image library listing six images including nginx:alpine, postgres:16-alpine and redis:alpine with digest and size columns

6 images · digests + sizes

Fig. 07 — Ports dashboard light mode

Ports dashboard showing shop-web-1 publishing host port 8080 to container port 80 with a clickable localhost URL

8080:80 → localhost

Fig. 08 — Health score light mode

Health dashboard with an overall score of 81 and per-container health scores, memory and CPU for four running containers

score 81 · 4 healthy

Fig. 09 — Embedded terminal light mode

Embedded terminal running container ls, listing the four running containers with state, IP, CPUs and memory

container cli · built in

Fig. 10 — Kubernetes light mode

kindest/node v1.34.0

Fig. 11 — Dev containers light mode

Dev Containers view with an empty state pointing at projects with a devcontainer.json and a Browse Project toolbar button

.devcontainer support

Fig. 12 — Merged log streams light mode

Merged log stream from shop-web-1 and shop-api-1 showing nginx boot logs, HTTP access lines and heartbeat messages interleaved

merged streams · 2 containers

Drop-in replacement.

Same CLI. Same Compose files. Same API. Just faster, lighter, and with real isolation.

Native CLIListing 01

# Run containers $ container run -d --name web -p 8080:80 nginx web # View logs $ container logs web "GET / HTTP/1.1" 200 # Exec into container $ container exec web cat /etc/nginx/nginx.conf worker_processes auto;

Docker CLI via KegListing 02

# Point Docker at Keg $ export DOCKER_HOST=unix://$HOME/.keg/docker.sock $ docker ps CONTAINER ID IMAGE STATUS PORTS a1b2c3d4e5f6 nginx Up 2m 0.0.0.0:8080->80 $ docker info Server: Keg (Apple Containerization)

Your compose files. Zero changes.

Dependency ordering, networks, volumes, port mapping, env vars. Keg's orchestrator handles it all.

docker-compose.ymlListing 03

services: web: image: nginx:latest ports: ["8080:80"] depends_on: [api] api: image: node:20-alpine environment: - DATABASE_URL=postgres://db/app depends_on: [db] db: image: postgres:16-alpine volumes: [pgdata:/var/lib/postgresql/data] volumes: pgdata:

LifecycleListing 04

# Or drive it from the Keg UI — Start Services $ docker compose up -d Compose up: shop ==> Service: db ==> Service: api ==> Service: web 3 of 3 services running. $ docker compose ps NAME SERVICE STATE shop-db-1 db running shop-api-1 api running shop-web-1 web running $ docker compose down

Local K8s. 90 seconds.

Full cluster inside an Apple Container. kubeadm, CNI, kubeconfig. Ready for kubectl.

Create Cluster

One click in Keg. kindest/node boots with kubeadm init.

kubectl get nodes NAME STATUS ROLES keg-k8s Ready control-plane

Deploy

Apply manifests. Deployments, services, configmaps, secrets.

kubectl apply -f deploy.yaml kubectl get pods nginx-abc12 1/1 Running

Scale & Update

Scale replicas, rolling updates, exec, logs. Full kubectl.

kubectl scale deploy nginx --replicas=3 kubectl set image deploy/nginx ... kubectl logs -f deploy/nginx

Numbers don't lie.

Benchmarked against Docker Desktop and OrbStack.

	Docker Desktop	OrbStack	Keg
Runtime	containerd in Linux VM	containerd in Linux VM	Apple VMs
Isolation	Process-level	Process-level	Hardware
Boot time	~30s	~2s	<1s
Idle RAM	~2 GB	~500 MB	69 MB
Docker API	✓	✓	✓
Compose	✓	✓	✓
Kubernetes	✓	✓	✓
Health score	—	—	✓
Dev containers	✓	—	✓
On-device agent	—	—	✓
Native macOS	Electron	Native-ish	SwiftUI
License	$9/seat/mo	Paid	Apache 2.0

Built for Apple Silicon.
Open source, free forever.

Requires macOS 26 (Tahoe) and Apple Silicon (M1/M2/M3/M4).

Download for Mac ↓ View on GitHub →

Containers onApple Silicon.