Overview of Shopware 6 Community Edition Installation

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The recommended way for developers to build Shopware is with the Docker setup, made simple as of March 2026 with a Shopware CLI installation path. Docker provides a consistent, production-like environment for development. Previous installation methods are available in the Legacy Setups section.

Welcome to the Installation Guide for Shopware 6 Community Edition (CE)! This guide will help you set up a local Shopware 6 development environment, whether you’re:

• Building a custom shop project
• Developing a plugin, app, or theme
• Contributing to the Shopware core

The Shopware 6 development environment is primarily supported and recommended for use with Docker. This platform enables developers to develop, ship, and run applications inside containers: lightweight, standalone, and executable packages.

Docker enables production-like conditions consistent across teams and CI/CD, and makes it easy to reset or rebuild environments. Docker is beneficial when full service parity is required (e.g., caching, queues, search).

Shopware CLI is the open-source command-line interface for working with Shopware 6. It is installed and configured separately from your Shopware instance.

The Shopware CLI installation method is in Alpha. If you try it and experience problems, please let us know by filing an issue. You may still use our Docker setup guide as a fallback.

Prerequisites

• Hardware requirements: Ensure your system meets them (PHP, DB, memory, and so on) before you install
• Shopware CLI
• Docker installed (recommended)

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The Shopware community has created related tooling that enables more automated or GUI-friendly ways to run Docker environments: DDEV and Dockware. Both are community-maintained and not officially supported by Shopware.

Use the Shopware CLI to create a shop

This command uses the Shopware CLI and creates a shop. In this example, we create my-shop:

shopware-cli project create my-shop

Alternatively, you can run the CLI without a separate installation via:

npx @shopware-ag/shopware-cli project create my-shop

Select Shopware version

The latest version will always be the top option. At the bottom of the terminal window are prompts for moving through and selecting menu options.

Choose Docker or skip

This is a yes/no question about whether to run Shopware locally using Docker, our recommended setup option. Choosing yes lets you continue with optional customization, or you can complete the installation immediately for a quick start.

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If you choose the Docker option, be sure that Docker is running. Otherwise, a "fatal error" message may appear.

Customize options (optional)

The customization options currently offered by the CLI include:

• Deployment Method: none (default), PaaS powered by Shopware, PaaS powered by Platform.sh, or Deployer PHP (SSH-based zero-downtime, for users not working with Docker)
• CI/CD System: none (default), GitHub Actions, or GitLab CI; choosing an option triggers creation of boilerplate pipeline templates
• Initialize Git repository: yes/no, for version control (yes by default)
• OpenSearch: yes/no (no is default), choose yes for large product catalogues and advanced search
• AMQP: for queue support for background jobs and messaging (yes by default)

Before the installation runs, you will receive a summary of your choices so you can verify them. At this point, the menu lets you restart the installation process or cancel if you need to correct something.

If the summary looks good, choose proceed to start the process of setting up Shopware and installing dependencies. This process might take a while.

When it finishes, users who did not install with Docker will receive guidance to continue.

Finish Docker setup (optional)

When setup finishes, users who installed with Docker will see this prompt:

• Start containers: cd <project name> && make up
• Set up Shopware: make setup
• Stop containers: make down (do this later)

Running make up starts Shopware and all required services (web server, database, search, Mailpit, etc.) in the background. Docker images already include all required PHP extensions and services, so the system-check step of the installer is always fulfilled.

Running make setup is necessary to access the new shop.

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What happens during make setup:

• The Makefile runs the Shopware installer inside the web container
• Shopware is installed automatically (no browser wizard required)
• A MariaDB database is created
• An admin user is created, with username admin and password shopware
• Required services (database, search, mail, etc.) are preconfigured and run inside Docker
• The Shopware project is configured to connect to the database via the Docker service name database
• Database credentials are defined in the compose.yaml
• If Elasticsearch was enabled during project creation, a compatible search service runs as part of the Docker stack.

Check the container status anytime with the following command:

docker compose ps

Accessing the new shop (all setups)

The prompt also provides links to access the new shop in the browser:

• Storefront: http://127.0.0.1:8000
• Admin: http://127.0.0.1:8000/admin
• Credentials: admin / shopware

Users who do not install with Docker can also use the Storefront and Administration URLs to continue.

If you're setting up Shopware for the very first time, you may prefer to complete Shopware installation from the Administration UI using the First Run Wizard:

• Sign in or create a Shopware account; this is necessary when you want to install Store extensions
• Connect to the Shopware Store
• Install plugins or themes from the Store
• Configure payment methods if you need them (not required for local development)

Basic shop settings such as shop name, default language, and currency can be changed later in the Admin under Settings > Shop > Basic information.

However, most developers will want to continue from the terminal.

Next steps

Continue with the Development guide.