📦 Flarum-In-A-Box
One command. ~60 extensions. A fully working Flarum 2.x forum.
Inspired by the discussion about demo sites + the fact that PianoTell itself is already on Docker, I built Flarum-In-A-Box — an all-in-one Docker container that gives you a complete Flarum 2.x forum with ~60 popular extensions pre-installed. No server setup, no configuration, no database provisioning.
Now everyone can have admin access and customize Flarum 2.x at will in the comfort and safety of Flarum-In-A-Box.
Quick Start
- Install Docker Desktop
- Search for
pianotell/flarum-in-a-box
- Click Run — in Optional Settings be sure to set the host port to
8080
Open http://localhost:8080 and you're in. 🚀
This is the One Command:
docker run -d -p 8080:80 --name flarum-in-a-box pianotell/flarum-in-a-box
To update to the latest release, run these three commands:
docker pull pianotell/flarum-in-a-box
docker rm -f flarum-in-a-box
docker run -d -p 8080:80 --name flarum-in-a-box pianotell/flarum-in-a-box
Screenshots
Why?
This makes it effortless for anyone to:
- 🧪 Demo Flarum for fun and profit
- 💻 Develop extensions against a real, fully loaded Flarum instance
- 📚 Learn and experiment with features and extensions
- 🏗️ Test themes like the included Avocado theme
⚠️ This is a demo/playground image — not intended for production use but perfect for testing and development. Data is ephemeral for the lifetime of the container.
What's Inside?
PHP 8.5 on Alpine Linux, with nginx, MariaDB, and s6-overlay — all in a single container. Multi-arch (amd64 + arm64), so it runs on Intel PCs, Apple Silicon Macs, and ARM cloud instances.
~60 Extensions Pre-Installed
Enabled by default — Tags, Likes, Mentions, Lock, Sticky, Suspend, Markdown, BBCode, Emoji, Flags, Nicknames, Subscriptions, Approval, Statistics, Extension Manager, plus:
Composer & posting
Discussions & navigation
- Best Answer, Byobu (private discussions), Categories, Follow Tags, Frontpage, Sitemap, Synopsis, Discussion Views
- Stickiest, Last Post Avatar, External Links in New Tab
- Menu Control, Mobile Search, Mobile Tab
User experience
Moderation & admin
Other
Installed but not enabled (try them from Admin Panel → Extensions):
Ready Out of the Box
The container comes pre-configured with:
- Default accounts:
admin (Admin), moderator (Mod group — try the moderation tools), user, plus user1–user5 — all with password password
- 8 sample tags with icons and colors (General, Announcements, Support, Feedback, Showcase, Off-Topic, Guides, Bugs)
- 9 seed discussions including a 🛠️ Moderation Playground — a deliberately-heated thread where
user1–user5 argue about moderation policy so you can practice locking, hiding, suspending, and reviewing logs (via Log Viewer) on real-looking content
- Email auto-verified on signup — no mail server needed
- Rankings page accessible to everyone
Tips & Tricks
Run Flarum CLI commands directly from the host:
docker exec flarum-in-a-box php flarum info
Get a shell inside the container (to run Composer, edit files, etc.):
docker exec -it flarum-in-a-box /bin/sh
Copy files to and from the container:
# Host → container
docker cp my-logo.png flarum-in-a-box:/var/www/html/public/assets/
# Container → host
docker cp flarum-in-a-box:/var/www/html/config.php ./config.php
Technical Details
- Base: PHP 8.5-FPM on Alpine Linux (multi-stage build)
- Web server: nginx
- Database: MariaDB (bundled, internal)
- Process manager: s6-overlay (nginx + PHP-FPM + MariaDB)
- Architectures: amd64, arm64
Links
Feedback Welcome!
Is this useful to anyone at all?
