![Ferret]()
Ferret
Container
Self-hosted home inventory: find anything you own. Photos, barcodes, QR labels, warranties, maintenance and an insurance report, with a REST API, an MCP server and optional AI on your own models.
Image details
Configuration
TypeContainerlinuxferretproject/ferret:latest8787:8787/tcp/dataPUBLIC_URL=''unless-stoppedTemplate by ferret-project
Report issueNotes
Standalone Install
Select an install method, to see config/commands for deploying Ferret
Install on Portainer
Import all app templates into your Portainer instance, for easy 1-click deploys
- Ensure both Docker and Portainer are installed, and up-to-date
- Log into your Portainer web UI
- Under Settings → App Templates, paste the below URL
- Head to Home → App Templates, and the list of apps will show up
- Select Ferret, fill in any config options, and hit Deploy
Template Import URL
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Lissy93/portainer-templates/main/templates.json
Show Me
More install options in our documentation.
Try the demo · Install · Help · Discord
Ferret is a home inventory you run yourself. Your household's properties, rooms and boxes; the things in them with photos, receipts and manuals; warranties, maintenance and stock — all on your own server, shared with the people you live with. And when you need something, Ferret tells you where it is.
What it does
Add things fast, label boxes, find anything, keep receipts and warranties, schedule maintenance, track stock and the shopping list, remember what you lent, and print an insurance report. Claude can do all of it too, over MCP.Why Ferret
- Your server, your data. One Docker container with SQLite. Uploads are encrypted at rest with a key per
- Households, not just accounts. Owners, admins, members and read-only viewers; invitations by email; single
- AI is optional. Point it at your own models (Ollama, any OpenAI-compatible server, docling) for suggestions from
- Made for the phone. An installable app that works offline, with barcode and QR scanning built in.
Run it (Docker)
curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ferret-project/ferret/main/compose.yaml
curl -o .env https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ferret-project/ferret/main/.env.example
# In .env: AUTH_SECRET and FILES_KEY (each: openssl rand -base64 32), and PUBLIC_URL
docker compose up -dThe image is on GitHub's registry (
ghcr.io/ferret-project/ferret) and Docker Hub
(ferretproject/ferret) — the same tags on both (latest, or a release like 2026.11.2), for x86-64 and 64-bit ARM.Then open
PUBLIC_URL; the first account made is the server admin. Keep a copy of FILES_KEY somewhere safe —
without it, uploaded files can't be read. Behind a reverse proxy, set TRUSTED_PROXIES to its address.The help is built in at
/docs: installing,
every setting,
AI, backups
and connecting Claude.Use it with Claude (MCP)
Ferret has an MCP server built in at/mcp, so Claude (or any MCP client) can use your inventory for you:- "Where did we put the tent?"
- "Add the new blender — it was $89 at Target, it's in the kitchen."
- "We used the last furnace filter." (stock goes down, and it's on the shopping list)
- "What maintenance is due this month, and when does the dishwasher warranty end?"
Make a key in Ferret (Household & settings → Claude & API → New key), then:
claude mcp add --transport http ferret https://ferret.example.com/mcp --header "Authorization: Bearer ferret_…"Other clients that speak Streamable HTTP take the same address and header (
X-API-Key: ferret_… works too):{
"mcpServers": {
"ferret": {
"type": "http",
"url": "https://ferret.example.com/mcp",
"headers": { "Authorization": "Bearer ferret_…" }
}
}
}Clients that only start a local program and talk to it over stdio (Docker's MCP Toolkit, desktop apps' config files) can use the small bridge in
contrib/mcp-bridge: it forwards each message to your Ferret with the
key. Ferret is also listed in the MCP Registry as
io.github.ferret-project/ferret.What Claude can do (60 tools):
| Find | search by words and meaning, ask questions answered from receipts and manuals, items, places, history, recently deleted; look at an item's photos |
| Add and change | add items (also from a photo, or a whole room's photos), update, move, delete and restore, change many at once; properties, rooms and categories; QR labels |
| Upkeep | maintenance by date or by use (odometer, engine hours), warranties and claims, recalls, service providers |
| Household | stock and the shopping list, lending, barcodes, collections, the insurance report and coverage limits, what needs attention |
Safe by design. A key acts for one person in one household, can be read-only (Claude can look and ask, but the tools that change things aren't offered) and can expire; revoke it any time. Viewers' keys are always read-only. Deleted things wait 30 days in Recently deleted, and nothing a model suggests from a photo or document is applied until someone confirms it.
Develop
Requirements: Node 26+, pnpm 10 (npm install -g corepack && corepack enable).cp .env.example .env # AUTH_SECRET and FILES_KEY, as above
pnpm install
pnpm dev # server on :8787, web app on :5173
pnpm test
pnpm typecheck| Path | What |
|---|---|
apps/server | Hono API, Better Auth, Drizzle + SQLite; MCP server; adapters behind ports (src/ports.ts) |
apps/web | React 19 + Vite + Tailwind v4 + FlyonUI PWA |
apps/docs | The help (VitePress), served at /docs |
packages/shared | Zod schemas and helpers shared by the server and the web app |
License
MIT. Questions, ideas or something odd? Come say hi on Discord.
Serve Ferret 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 ferret.example.com to http://ferret:8787
Add this to your Caddyfile
ferret.example.com {
reverse_proxy http://ferret:8787
}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 ferret - Exit codes help too:
137means killed, usually out of memory.126or127means the command inside the image is broken.
Port already in use
If deployment fails with "Bind for 0.0.0.0:8787 failed: port is already allocated", something else on your server is using that port.
- Find what's using it:
sudo ss -tlnp | grep :8787 - Stop the other service, or pick a different host port. In
8787:8787only 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:8787. The 0.0.0.0 link Portainer shows isn't a real address. - Give it a minute after first deploy, ferret can take a while to initialise.
- Make sure your firewall allows the port, e.g.
sudo ufw allow 8787
Image won't pull
Test the pull directly on the host: docker pull ferretproject/ferret: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 loginto 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.
- This image supports:
amd64, arm64 - 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 ferret --format '{{.State.ExitCode}}' - Still stuck? Redeploy once with the restart policy set to
noso the failure stays visible.
Required settings are blank
PUBLIC_URL has no default value, and ferret may crash or misbehave if left empty.
- Fill it in on the deploy screen before hitting deploy.
Raise an issue
Found something which isn't working as it should? Here's how to report it.
- Bug within the app: Open an issue within ferret's repo
- Template not working: Open an issue on ferret-project/ferret
- This website not working: Open an issue on lissy93/portainer-templates
A single container
Ferret runs as one container, the simplest kind of app here. Just the one image to pull and nothing else wired up alongside it.
The app image
An image is the app packed up ready to go, everything Ferret needs bundled into one download. This template pulls ferretproject/ferret:latest, which Docker fetches once (about 152 MB) and then starts your own copy from.
Where the image comes from
Docker pulls its images from registries, public libraries of ready-built apps. Ferret's comes from Docker Hub, published by ferretproject.
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. Newest right now is 2026.11.5. Pin a specific tag if you would rather stay on one version.
Which machines it runs on
Every image is built for particular CPU types. This one ships for amd64, arm64, so it runs on both regular x86 servers and ARM boards like a Raspberry Pi.
Ports
A port is the door the app answers on. A mapping like 8787:8787 means it's reachable on port 8787 of your server, where the left number is yours to change and the right one belongs to the app. It opens:
8787:8787
Volumes
A volume is where Ferret 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:
/dataas a volume Docker manages for you
Environment variables
Environment variables are the settings you hand over when you deploy, things like a password or a timezone. Ferret takes 1 of them, and one needs a value before it'll start properly:
PUBLIC_URL, needs a value. For example http://192.168.1.10:8787 — links Ferret sends, passkeys and single sign-on use it.
Restart policy
The restart policy here is unless-stopped, so Docker restarts Ferret 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).
Networking
Nothing custom is set, so Ferret 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 ferret. That's what you'll spot in the containers list and use in commands like docker logs ferret.
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.
Portainer app templates
Zooming out, this whole page comes from a Portainer app template: a short recipe telling Portainer how to set Ferret up. Add the template list to Portainer once, then deploying Ferret is a click rather than a wall of config.