Portainer Templates logo

Portainer Templates

Node Red Node Red

Stack

OtherWebTools

Node-RED is a programming tool for wiring together hardware devices, APIs and online services in new and interesting ways. It provides a browser-based editor that makes it easy to wire together flows using the wide range of nodes in the palette that can be deployed to its runtime in a single-click.

Image details

Pulls: 320.8M
Architecture: amd64, arm64, arm/v7
Image size: 218 MB
Latest: 4.1.13-22
User: nodered
Created: Sep 30, 2019
Updated: 6 days ago
Status: active

Configuration

Type
Compose
Platform
linux
Image
nodered/node-red:latest
Ports
1880:1880
Volumes
/data : data
Env vars
NODE_RED_CREDENTIAL_SECRET=${NODE_RED_CREDENTIAL_SECRET}TZ=${TZ}
Restart
unless-stopped
Source
Repo

Template by novaspirit·Source

Notes

Template created by Pi-Hosted Series
Check our Github page: https://github.com/pi-hosted/pi-hosted

Official Webpage: https://nodered.org/
Official Docker Documentation: https://nodered.org/docs/getting-started/docker


Standalone Install

Select an install method, to see config/commands for deploying Node Red

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 Node Red, 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:

version: "3.7"
services:
  app:
    image: nodered/node-red:latest
    container_name: node-red
    environment:
      NODE_RED_CREDENTIAL_SECRET: ${NODE_RED_CREDENTIAL_SECRET}
      TZ: ${TZ}
    volumes:
      - data:/data
    ports:
      - 1880:1880
    restart: unless-stopped

volumes:
  data:

Or deploy it directly from the source:

git clone https://github.com/pi-hosted/pi-hosted/
cd pi-hosted
docker compose -f stack/node-red.yml up -d

More install options in our documentation.

logo Node-RED

Low-code programming for event-driven applications

To run Node-RED in Docker in its simplest form just run: 
docker run -it -p 1880:1880 -v myNodeREDdata:/data --name mynodered nodered/node-red
or for the minimal version 
docker run -it -p 1880:1880 -v myNodeREDdata:/data --name mynodered nodered/node-red:latest-minimal
The minimal version does not contain build tools or support for projects.
Note: RaspberryPI Zero and 1 users (Arm6 cpu) will need to use the specific tag name to install due to an upstream docker bug in the architecture detection. For example : 
docker run -it -p 1880:1880 -v myNodeREDdata:/data --name mynodered nodered/node-red:1.0.1-10-minimal-arm32v6
for the minimal node 10 version.
For more detailed information see our docker guide.
For any questions please use the public Node-RED discourse forum.
For general information about Node-RED please visit the website.
This project is available on github.

Serve Node Red 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 node-red.example.com to http://app:1880

Add this to your Caddyfile

node-red.example.com {
	reverse_proxy http://app:1880
}

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 0.0.0.0:1880 failed: port is already allocated", something else on your server is using that port.

  • Find what's using it: sudo ss -tlnp | grep :1880
  • Stop the other service, or pick a different host port. In 1880:1880 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:1880. The 0.0.0.0 link Portainer shows isn't a real address.
  • Give it a minute after first deploy, app can take a while to initialise.
  • Make sure your firewall allows the port, e.g. sudo ufw allow 1880

Image won't pull

Test the pull directly on the host: docker pull nodered/node-red: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.

  • This image supports: amd64, arm64, arm/v7
  • 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.

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

Node Red 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 Node Red needs bundled into one download. This template pulls nodered/node-red:latest, which Docker fetches once (about 218 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. Node Red's comes from Docker Hub, published by nodered.

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 4.1.13-22. 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, arm/v7, 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 1880:1880 means it's reachable on port 1880 of your server, where the left number is yours to change and the right one belongs to the app. It opens:

  • 1880:1880

Volumes

A volume is where Node Red 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:

  • /data kept in the data volume Docker manages

Environment variables

Environment variables are the settings you hand over when you deploy, things like a password or a timezone. Node Red takes 2 of them, all with defaults you can leave alone or tweak:

  • NODE_RED_CREDENTIAL_SECRET, pulled from your own environment
  • TZ, pulled from your own environment

Restart policy

The restart policy here is unless-stopped, so Docker restarts Node Red 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 Node Red 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 app. That's what you'll spot in the containers list and use in commands like docker logs app.

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 Node Red up. Add the template list to Portainer once, then deploying Node Red is a click rather than a wall of config.