docker.service: Start request repeated too quickly.

morttttem · 2025-11-07 15:52:57

systemctl start docker.service yields
Job for docker.service failed because the control process exited with error code.
See "systemctl status docker.service" and "journalctl -xeu docker.service" for details.

Below are the data I gathered that could be useful although I cannot see any issue with them.

Docker Version: 28.5.2

systemctl status docker yields

× docker.service - Docker Application Container Engine
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/docker.service; enabled; preset: disabled)
     Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Fri 2025-11-07 17:34:27 EET; 14min ago
 Invocation: a35d44bec8bd4e83ab1ef97b30264dbe
TriggeredBy: × docker.socket
       Docs: https://docs.docker.com
    Process: 15795 ExecStart=/usr/bin/dockerd -H fd:// --containerd=/run/containerd/containerd.sock (code=exited, status=2)
   Main PID: 15795 (code=exited, status=2)
   Mem peak: 37.6M
        CPU: 76ms

journalctl -xeu docker.service yields

systemd[1]: docker.service: Start request repeated too quickly.
systemd[1]: docker.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.

/usr/lib/systemd/docker.service has

[Unit]
Description=Docker Application Container Engine
Documentation=https://docs.docker.com
After=network-online.target nss-lookup.target docker.socket firewalld.service containerd.service time-set.target
Wants=network-online.target containerd.service
Requires=docker.socket
StartLimitBurst=3
StartLimitIntervalSec=60

[Service]
Type=notify
# the default is not to use systemd for cgroups because the delegate issues still
# exists and systemd currently does not support the cgroup feature set required
# for containers run by docker
ExecStart=/usr/bin/dockerd -H fd:// --containerd=/run/containerd/containerd.sock
ExecReload=/bin/kill -s HUP $MAINPID
TimeoutStartSec=0
RestartSec=2
Restart=always

# Having non-zero Limit*s causes performance problems due to accounting overhead
# in the kernel. We recommend using cgroups to do container-local accounting.
LimitNPROC=infinity
LimitCORE=infinity

# Comment TasksMax if your systemd version does not support it.
# Only systemd 226 and above support this option.
TasksMax=infinity

# set delegate yes so that systemd does not reset the cgroups of docker containers
Delegate=yes

# kill only the docker process, not all processes in the cgroup
KillMode=process
OOMScoreAdjust=-500

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Also there is no /etc/docker/daemon.json

I have referred previously to https://forums.docker.com/t/solved-dock … e/134444/3 but to no avail.

Any help will be greatly appreciated. I have tried to reinstall docker, update and restart my machine.

apstol · 2025-11-13 15:50:13

morttttem wrote:

/usr/lib/systemd/docker.service has

Is it a correct path? The path of docker.service on my system is:

/usr/lib/systemd/system/docker.service

Last edited by apstol (2025-11-13 15:50:30)

mihas · 2025-11-17 19:20:17

Had exact same problem. My context was I tried to start docker.service after install. Reboot took care of my issue. After logging in again the service was up.

morttttem · 2025-11-24 13:00:58

Deleting everything docker related in my system and reinstalling did fix the issue. Still no idea what the problem was

LordTlacoyo · 2026-02-26 18:24:22

Had same issue. In my case just after trying to enable docker and failing, I ran this journalctl command:

journalctl -u docker.service --since "5 minutes ago"

There I spotted I was missing some libs

dockerd[2619]: /usr/bin/dockerd: /usr/lib/libnftnl.so.11: version `LIBNFTNL_18' not found (required by /usr/lib/libnftables.so.1)

So I just installed them

sudo pacman -S libnftnl nftables

and it worked after that.

Scimmia · 2026-02-26 18:30:29

Both of which were already installed, all you did was update them. Don't do partial updates. Don't bump old, solved threads. Don't hijack threads for completely different issues.

WorMzy · 2026-02-26 22:47:49

Mod note: closing, for reasons noted.

Arch Linux

#1 2025-11-07 15:52:57

docker.service: Start request repeated too quickly.

#2 2025-11-13 15:50:13

Re: docker.service: Start request repeated too quickly.

#3 2025-11-17 19:20:17

Re: docker.service: Start request repeated too quickly.

#4 2025-11-24 13:00:58

Re: docker.service: Start request repeated too quickly.

#5 2026-02-26 18:24:22

Re: docker.service: Start request repeated too quickly.

#6 2026-02-26 18:30:29

Re: docker.service: Start request repeated too quickly.

#7 2026-02-26 22:47:49

Re: docker.service: Start request repeated too quickly.

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