Docker Desktop stuck on starting on windows 11

Docker Desktop
1

I installed version 4.45.0 on windows 11.

After installation, at first it complained WSL needed update. Which i did.
After that when starting it worked, but was very unstable. work for one or tow page loads and then crash. gradually became more and more unstable. would start the apache container, but not mysql.

I uninstalled and the GUI just sat at Docker starting.

worked with GPT and a couple of suggestions on this forrum, including couple of reinstall, couple of commands from GTP to remove files complete, clear out registry, tries older version 4.43 as well, but now it’s completely broken. When starting docker desktop as Admin, the GUI does not show, only the system tray icon show . when right click it says Docker starting. Clicking on quit docker does nothing.

Here some info about installation:

PS C:\Windows\system32> docker version
Client:
Version: 28.3.3
API version: 1.51
Go version: go1.24.5
Git commit: 980b856
Built: Fri Jul 25 11:36:03 2025
OS/Arch: windows/amd64
Context: desktop-linux
request returned 500 Internal Server Error for API route and version http://%2F%2F.%2Fpipe%2FdockerDesktopLinuxEngine/v1.51/version, check if the server supports the requested API version
PS C:\Windows\system32> wsl -l -v
NAME STATE VERSION

  • Ubuntu Stopped 2
    PS C:\Windows\system32> wsl --version
    WSL version: 2.5.10.0
    Kernel version: 6.6.87.2-1
    WSLg version: 1.0.66
    MSRDC version: 1.2.6074
    Direct3D version: 1.611.1-81528511
    DXCore version: 10.0.26100.1-240331-1435.ge-release
    Windows version: 10.0.26100.4946
    PS C:\Windows\system32> docker run hello-world
    docker: request returned 500 Internal Server Error for API route and version http://%2F%2F.%2Fpipe%2FdockerDesktopLinuxEngine/_ping, check if the server supports the requested API version

Run ‘docker run --help’ for more information
PS C:\Windows\system32> docker desktop restart
⠙ Starting Docker Desktop

2

Exactly same problem. Exactly same versions

UPD: In my case problem was with disabled ipv6 in .wslconfig. As soon as I commented it out, Docker started without problems

1 Like
3

You my friend, are an absolute wizard.
I have been banging my head against a wall.

I started rolling back to previous Docker Desktop versions and found workaround where starting a WSL shell and running the hello-world image would then allow a PowerShell terminal to run containers without issue but it seemed quite hacky.

How did you figure out this was the culprit?

4

It’s unexplainable magic and 3h of heavy testing for 2 people :slight_smile: Glad it helped.

1 Like
5

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