Images not showing in Laravel Docker production following this guide: https://docs.docker.com/guides/frameworks/laravel/production-setup/#create-a-dockerfile-for-nginx-production

This is my NGINX production Dockerfile :

FROM debian AS builder

# Install Node.js and build tools
RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends \
    curl \
    nodejs \
    npm \
    && apt-get clean && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/* /tmp/* /var/tmp/*

# Set working directory
WORKDIR /var/www

# Copy Laravel application code
COPY ./src/. /var/www

RUN npm install && npm run build

FROM nginx:1.21-alpine

COPY --from=builder /var/www/public /var/www/public

COPY ./fullchain.pem /etc/nginx/fullchain.pem
COPY ./privkey.pem /etc/nginx/privkey.pem
COPY ./ssl-dhparams.pem /etc/nginx/ssl-dhparams.pem
COPY ./nginx/nginx.conf /etc/nginx/conf.d/

WORKDIR /var/www/public

EXPOSE 443
CMD ["nginx", "-g", "daemon off;"]

This is my PHP-FPM Dockerfile :

FROM php:8.1-fpm AS builder

RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y \
  curl \
  libpng-dev \
  libonig-dev \
  libxml2-dev \
  libzip-dev \
  zip \
  unzip \
  && docker-php-ext-install pdo_mysql mbstring exif pcntl bcmath gd zip opcache \
  && apt-get autoremove -y && apt-get clean && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/* /tmp/* /var/tmp/*

WORKDIR /var/www

COPY ./src/. /var/www

RUN curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php -- --install-dir=/usr/local/bin --filename=composer \
    && composer install --no-dev --optimize-autoloader --no-interaction --no-progress --prefer-dist
   
FROM php:8.1-fpm AS production

ENV PHP_OPCACHE_VALIDATE_TIMESTAMPS="0" \
  PHP_OPCACHE_MAX_ACCELERATED_FILES="10000" \
  PHP_OPCACHE_MEMORY_CONSUMPTION="192" \
  PHP_OPCACHE_MAX_WASTED_PERCENTAGE="10"

RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y \
  libpng-dev \
  libonig-dev \
  libxml2-dev \
  libzip-dev \
  zip \
  && apt-get autoremove -y && apt-get clean && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/* /tmp/* /var/tmp/*
  
COPY ./php/uploads.ini /usr/local/etc/php/conf.d/uploads.ini
RUN sed -i 's/9000/9031/' /usr/local/etc/php-fpm.d/zz-docker.conf

#COPY ./src/storage /var/www/storage-init I can't see this in use ???

COPY --from=builder /usr/local/lib/php/extensions/ /usr/local/lib/php/extensions/
COPY --from=builder /usr/local/etc/php/conf.d/ /usr/local/etc/php/conf.d/
COPY --from=builder /usr/local/bin/docker-php-ext-* /usr/local/bin/

COPY --from=builder /usr/local/etc/php/php.ini-production /usr/local/etc/php/php.ini
RUN sed -i '/\[www\]/a pm.status_path = /status' /usr/local/etc/php-fpm.d/zz-docker.conf
COPY --from=builder /var/www /var/www
WORKDIR /var/www

RUN php artisan config:cache
RUN php artisan route:cache
RUN php artisan view:cache
RUN php artisan storage:link

RUN chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www
USER www-data

# Expose port 9000 and start php-fpm server
EXPOSE 9031
CMD ["php-fpm"]

However, when I start the Laravel app, images are not showing. I even tried adding an image on the welcome.blade.php file as:

<img src="{{asset('/storage/img/quote.svg')}}" alt="">
    </body>
</html>

but on Chrome Developer tools, it shows error 404. Kindly help...

simotion

2 months ago

Level 27

Bit rusty on Docker, but I'll do my best to help.

Have you verified that the public/storage symlink exists inside the Nginx container, not just the PHP container?

Since you're using separate Nginx and PHP-FPM containers, php artisan storage:link runs in the PHP container — but Nginx is the one serving static files.

In your Nginx Dockerfile you only copy:

COPY --from=builder /var/www/public /var/www/public

That means:

The storage directory is not copied

The symlink created in the PHP container is not present

There is no shared volume between containers

So when the browser requests /storage/..., Nginx simply doesn’t have that path — hence the 404.

You have a few options:

Share the entire project directory as a Docker volume between Nginx and PHP

Build both containers from the same source layer so storage and the symlink exist in both

If these are static assets that ship with your app (like quote.svg), consider placing them directly in /public/img instead of storage

Right now, Nginx has no access to the storage directory, which is almost certainly the issue.

1 like

FireBlade

2 months ago

Level 2

I tried rebuilding the NGINX image and I get this error:

Step 6/15 : RUN php artisan storage:link
 ---> Running in a8c64eeb9323
/bin/sh: 1: php: not found

I am considering building the images as you suggest...

simotion

2 months ago

Level 27

You're running the php artisan command in the NGINX container instead of the PHP container, that's why you getting the error message.

1 like

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