Prerequisites

• A Plain Ubuntu Server (Ubuntu Jammy in my case)
• Fully Qualified Domain (Can be a subdomain)

Installing Docker

Docker is a software platform that enables you to build applications using containers. Containers are small and lightweight execution environments that use the operating system kernel but otherwise run in isolation from each other. This allows you to package your application with all its dependencies, making it easy to deploy and run on any system.

To install Docker, please refer to Webdock’s official guide here.

Installing Docker Compose plugin

Manually fetching docker-compose binary is no longer necessary as Docker now provides a compose package. If you've installed Docker using our guide, then you've installed compose as well.

If in case you already use the "docker-compose" command to deploy containers, then that should work too. You'll need to follow the rest of this guide and do "docker-compose up -d" instead.

Creating a Docker Container Config

I will create a docker container using the compose plugin.

To do so, make a new folder in your home directory called vaultwarden, and enter it:

$ mkdir ~/vaultwarden
$ cd ~/vaultwarden

Then create a Docker Compose configuration file:

$ nano docker-compose.yml

And add the following, save and exit:

version: '3'

services:

  vaultwarden:
    image: vaultwarden/server:latest
    container_name: vaultwarden
    restart: always
    environment:
      - WEBSOCKET_ENABLED=true
    volumes:
      - ./vw-data:/data

  caddy:
    image: caddy:2
    container_name: caddy
    restart: always
    ports:
      - 80:80
      - 443:443
    volumes:
      - ./Caddyfile:/etc/caddy/Caddyfile:ro
      - ./caddy-config:/config
      - ./caddy-data:/data
    environment:
      - DOMAIN=https://example.com
      - EMAIL=any@domain.com
      - LOG_FILE=/data/access.log

Ensure to replace example.com and the email with your domain and email, respectively.

To check for syntax errors, run:

$ docker compose config

If you see no errors, you should see the contents of the YML file, else re-check if you made mistakes while copy-pasting the content or when replacing the domain and email data.

Configure Caddy

Caddy is an open-source web server platform designed to be secure and easy to use. Due to its lightweight, I will use Caddy to reverse proxy our Docker container.

The first thing is to create a configuration file for Caddy called Caddyfile:

$ nano Caddyfile

Add the following to the same, save, and then exit:

{$DOMAIN}:443 {

  log {
    level INFO

    output file {$LOG_FILE} {

      roll_size 10MB

      roll_keep 10
    }

  }

  # Get a cert by using the ACME HTTP-01 challenge.

  tls {$EMAIL}
  encode gzip

  # Headers to improve security.

  header {

  # Enable HSTS

  Strict-Transport-Security "max-age=31536000;"

  # Enable cross-site filter (XSS)

  X-XSS-Protection "1; mode=block"

  # Disallow the site to be rendered within a frame (clickjacking protection)

  X-Frame-Options "DENY"

  # Prevent search engines from indexing

  X-Robots-Tag "none"

  # Remove Caddy branding

  -Server

  }

  # Redirect notifications to the WebSocket.

  reverse_proxy /notifications/hub vaultwarden:3012

  reverse_proxy vaultwarden:80 {

       header_up X-Real-IP {remote_host}

  }

}

These lines in the Caddyfile configure Caddy to forward HTTPS requests from port 443 to Vaultwarden. It also adds additional headers to improve security, including HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) and Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) protection.

Starting the Vaultwarden instance

Now, this is simple. Starting up Vaultwarden can take a few seconds when docker compose is detached:

$ docker-compose up -d

You should see a result like this:

Now, your self-hosted Vaultwarden instance should be accessible on your domain!

Visit https://<your-domain> and you should see this.

Since this is the first time, create an account by clicking on "Create Account". That's it, and now you should have a fully working Vaultwarden server.

Conclusion

This guide provided step-by-step instructions to Vaultwarden, an open-source Password Manager on your Webdock Server.

Aayush Nair has been designing WordPress websites for eight years now. He is also a content writer, writing blogs on technology and related topics, and likes helping people in his free time.