Installation

Introduction

You can set up the Azure emulator by utilizing LocalStack for Azure Docker image. Before starting, ensure you have a valid LOCALSTACK_AUTH_TOKEN to access the Azure emulator. Refer to the Auth Token guide to obtain your Auth Token and specify it in the LOCALSTACK_AUTH_TOKEN environment variable.

The Azure Docker image is available on the LocalStack Docker Hub. To pull the Azure Docker image, execute the following command:

$ docker pull localstack/localstack-azure-alpha

You can start the Azure emulator using the following methods:

1. localstack CLI
2. docker CLI
3. Docker Compose

localstack CLI

To start the Azure emulator using the localstack CLI, execute the following command:

$ export LOCALSTACK_AUTH_TOKEN=<your_auth_token>
$ IMAGE_NAME=localstack/localstack-azure-alpha localstack start

docker CLI

To start the Azure emulator using the docker CLI, execute the following command:

$ docker run \
    --rm -it \
    -p 4566:4566 \
    -v /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock \
    -v ~/.localstack/volume:/var/lib/localstack \
    -e LOCALSTACK_AUTH_TOKEN=${LOCALSTACK_AUTH_TOKEN:?} \
    localstack/localstack-azure-alpha

Docker Compose

Create a docker-compose.yml file with the specified content:

version: "3.8"

services:
  localstack:
    container_name: "localstack-main"
    image: localstack/localstack-azure-alpha
    ports:
      - "127.0.0.1:4566:4566"
    environment:
      - LOCALSTACK_AUTH_TOKEN=${LOCALSTACK_AUTH_TOKEN:?}
    volumes:
      - "./volume:/var/lib/localstack"

Start the Azure emulator with the following command:

$ docker-compose up

Updating

To update the Azure Docker container, pull the latest image and restart the container. The latest tag is the nightly build of the Azure Docker image.

Starting with the end-of-March 2026 release, versioned Azure image tags follow calendar versioning in the YYYY.MM.patch format (for example, 2026.03.0). Refer to the available tags on Docker Hub for the latest releases.