This page provides detailed instructions on how to update or install your SearXNG instance using Docker. The installation directory is set in this example as `/data1/searxng-docker/`.

Follow the steps below to update your SearXNG instance to the latest version.

First, open your terminal and navigate to the directory where your SearXNG instance is installed.

cd /data1/searxng-docker/

Use the `docker-compose pull` command to download the latest version of the Docker images defined in your `docker-compose.yml` file.

docker-compose pull

This command fetches the most recent versions of the SearXNG Docker images available.

After downloading the new images, restart the containers to apply the updates. Run the following command to bring the updated version into effect:

docker-compose up -d

This will recreate and restart the containers with the latest versions of the images.

To ensure that the update was successful, visit your running SearXNG instance in a web browser. You can also list the currently running containers with:

docker container ls

Check that the SearXNG container is running and that it is indeed using the latest image.

If any old containers are still in place and no longer needed, you might want to clean them up. You can remove unnecessary containers with the following command:

docker container prune

This command removes all stopped containers and frees up space.

If you don't have SearXNG installed yet, follow the steps below for a fresh installation:

Make sure Docker is installed on your system. If Docker is not installed, follow the official Docker documentation to set it up.

Navigate to your desired installation directory and clone the SearXNG Docker repository:

cd /data1/
git clone https://github.com/searxng/searxng-docker.git
cd searxng-docker/

Edit the `.env` file to set the appropriate hostname and email address:

nano .env

Generate a secret key to be used in SearXNG by running:

sed -i "s|ultrasecretkey|$(openssl rand -hex 32)|g" searxng/settings.yml

Edit the `searxng/settings.yml` file according to your needs. You can configure various aspects of your SearXNG instance including search engines, API keys, and user interface options.

nano searxng/settings.yml

After finishing the configuration, start SearXNG in the background using Docker Compose:

docker-compose up -d

Ensure that SearXNG is running correctly by checking the status of the Docker container:

docker container ls

You can also visit your SearXNG instance by navigating to the hostname you set in the `.env` file.