Guide — Enshrouded Dedicated Server (Docker)

Deploy a fully automated, always-up-to-date Enshrouded Dedicated Server using Docker. No manual updates, no configuration drift, no root containers.

How It Works

The container ships Wine + SteamCMD baked into the image. On every startup, it:

Starts a headless display (Xvfb) so Wine has somewhere to render
Runs SteamCMD to pull the latest Enshrouded Dedicated Server from Steam
Launches enshrouded_server.exe via Wine

The Docker image itself never changes between game updates — SteamCMD handles that at runtime. Your saves and config live in mounted volumes and survive any image rebuild or upgrade.

Requirements

Ubuntu 22.04+ VM (or any Linux host with Docker)
~10 GB free disk space (6 GB game + Wine prefix + saves)
UDP ports 15637 and 27015 open on your firewall

Option A — One-Line Setup (Fresh VM)

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/MrGuato/enshrouded-docker/main/setup.sh | bash

This script:

Installs Docker if not present
Installs the Docker Compose plugin if missing
Clones the repo if you’re not already in it
Runs docker compose up -d --build

Note: If Docker was just installed, the script will exit and ask you to log out and back in (group membership change). Re-run the script after logging back in.

Option B — Manual (Docker Already Installed)

git clone https://github.com/MrGuato/enshrouded-docker
cd enshrouded-docker
docker compose up -d

Watch startup progress:

docker compose logs -f

First run downloads ~6 GB from Steam. Subsequent starts are fast because the game files are cached in a volume.

Configuration

Edit environment variables directly in docker-compose.yml, or pass them via a .env file in the same directory.

Variable	Default	Description
`SERVER_NAME`	`Enshrouded Docker Server`	Name shown in the server browser
`SERVER_SLOTS`	`16`	Maximum players
`SERVER_PASSWORD`	(empty)	Leave empty for a public server
`GAME_PORT`	`15637`	UDP game port
`QUERY_PORT`	`27015`	UDP query port
`UPDATE_ON_START`	`1`	Set to `0` to skip Steam update on startup
`WINEPREFIX`	`/home/steam/.wine`	Wine prefix location (don’t change unless you know why)

Example .env file

SERVER_NAME=My Awesome Server
SERVER_SLOTS=8
SERVER_PASSWORD=secretpassword
UPDATE_ON_START=1

Ports

Port	Protocol	Purpose
`15637`	UDP	Game traffic (required)
`27015`	UDP	Server discovery / query (required)

Firewall (UFW):

sudo ufw allow 15637/udp
sudo ufw allow 27015/udp

iptables:

sudo iptables -A INPUT -p udp --dport 15637 -j ACCEPT
sudo iptables -A INPUT -p udp --dport 27015 -j ACCEPT

If you’re on a home network, also forward both ports on your router to the VM’s local IP.

Persistence

All state lives outside the container in three directories created automatically on first run:

enshrouded-config/
 ├─ savegame/               ← world saves
 ├─ logs/                   ← server logs
 └─ enshrouded_server.json  ← auto-generated server config

enshrouded-server/          ← game binaries (SteamCMD target)
enshrouded-wine/            ← Wine prefix

You can safely:

Rebuild or upgrade the Docker image
Change the SERVER_NAME, slots, or password
Move the entire directory to another host

Your world data will be intact as long as these directories are preserved.

Updating the Server

Game updates happen automatically on container restart when UPDATE_ON_START=1. SteamCMD only downloads changed files, so updates are fast.

To also pull the latest Docker image:

docker compose pull
docker compose up -d

To restart without updating the game:

UPDATE_ON_START=0 docker compose up -d

Common Operations

Stop the server:

docker compose down

Restart:

docker compose restart

View live logs:

docker compose logs -f

Open a shell inside the container:

docker exec -it enshrouded-server bash

Back up your world:

tar -czf enshrouded-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz enshrouded-config/savegame/

Troubleshooting

Server doesn’t appear in the browser

Confirm UDP 15637 and 27015 are open: sudo ufw status
Check the container is running and ports are published: docker ps
If behind a router, verify port forwarding is pointing to this VM’s IP
Wait ~60 seconds after startup — the healthcheck starts period is 3 minutes

Container exits immediately after starting

Check logs:

docker compose logs --tail=50

Common causes:

SteamCMD failed to reach Steam (transient — restart and try again)
Game binary not found after SteamCMD run (check for download errors in the log)
Volume permission issues (see below)

Permission errors on the data directories

sudo chown -R $USER:$USER ./enshrouded-config ./enshrouded-server ./enshrouded-wine

Wine or Xvfb errors in logs

These are usually harmless warnings from Wine initializing a new prefix. If the server still starts, ignore them. If it doesn’t start, check that enshrouded-wine/ is not corrupted — delete it and let the container re-initialize.

rm -rf ./enshrouded-wine
docker compose up -d

Security Notes

Runs as a non-root user inside the container (steam, uid 999)
No privileged mode required
Only UDP 15637 and 27015 are exposed — no management ports
All persistent state is in explicit volume mounts — the container itself is stateless

Recommended Practices

Use restart: unless-stopped so the server comes back after a VM reboot
Back up enshrouded-config/savegame/ on a schedule (cron + tar works fine)
Pin to a specific image tag (sha-abc1234 or YYYYMMDD) if you want controlled upgrades instead of always-latest
Keep UPDATE_ON_START=1 — it protects you from running a mismatched server version after a game update

Questions / Issues

Open an issue at github.com/MrGuato/enshrouded-docker