---
description: Control access to approved registries with Registry Access Management, ensuring secure Docker Desktop usage
keywords: registry, access, management, permissions, Docker Business feature, security, admin
title: Registry Access Management
tags: [admin]
aliases:
 - /desktop/hardened-desktop/registry-access-management/
 - /admin/organization/registry-access/
 - /docker-hub/registry-access-management/
 - /security/for-admins/registry-access-management/
weight: 30
---

{{< summary-bar feature_name="Registry access management" >}}

With Registry Access Management (RAM), administrators can ensure that their
developers using Docker Desktop only access allowed registries. This is done
through the Registry Access Management dashboard in Docker Hub or the
Docker Admin Console.

Registry Access Management supports both cloud and on-prem registries. This
feature operates at the DNS level and therefore is compatible with all
registries. You can add any hostname or domain name you’d like to include in the
list of allowed registries. However, if the registry redirects to other domains
such as `s3.amazon.com`, then you must add those domains to the list.

Example registries administrators can allow include:

 - Docker Hub. This is enabled by default.
 - Amazon ECR
 - GitHub Container Registry
 - Google Container Registry
 - GitLab Container Registry
 - Nexus
 - Artifactory

## Prerequisites

You must [enforce sign-in](../enforce-sign-in/_index.md). For Registry Access
Management to take effect, Docker Desktop users must authenticate to your
organization. Enforcing sign-in ensures that your Docker Desktop developers
always authenticate to your organization, even though they can authenticate
without it and the feature will take effect. Enforcing sign-in guarantees the
feature always takes effect.

## Configure Registry Access Management permissions

{{< tabs >}}
{{< tab name="Admin Console" >}}

{{% admin-registry-access product="admin" %}}

{{< /tab >}}
{{< tab name="Docker Hub" >}}

{{% include "hub-org-management.md" %}}

{{% admin-registry-access product="hub" %}}

{{< /tab >}}
{{< /tabs >}}

## Verify the restrictions

The new Registry Access Management policy takes effect after the developer
successfully authenticates to Docker Desktop using their organization
credentials. If a developer attempts to pull an image from a disallowed
registry via the Docker CLI, they receive an error message that the organization
has disallowed this registry.

## Caveats

There are certain limitations when using Registry Access Management:

- You can add up to 100 registries/domains.
- Windows image pulls and image builds are not restricted by default. For
Registry Access Management to take effect on Windows Container mode, you must
allow the Windows Docker daemon to use Docker Desktop's internal proxy by
selecting the [Use proxy for Windows Docker daemon](/manuals/desktop/settings-and-maintenance/settings.md#proxies)
setting.
- Builds such as `docker buildx` using a Kubernetes driver are not restricted.
- Builds such as `docker buildx` using a custom docker-container driver are not
restricted.
- Blocking is DNS-based. You must use a registry's access control mechanisms to
distinguish between “push” and “pull”.
- WSL 2 requires at least a 5.4 series Linux kernel (this does not apply to
earlier Linux kernel series).
- Under the WSL 2 network, traffic from all Linux distributions is restricted.
This will be resolved in the updated 5.15 series Linux kernel.
- Images pulled by Docker Desktop when Docker Debug or Kubernetes is enabled,
are not restricted by default even if Docker Hub is blocked by RAM.
- If Docker Hub access is restricted by RAM, pulls on images originating from Docker Hub are restricted even if the image has been previously cached by a registry mirror. See [Using Registry Access Management (RAM) with a registry mirror](/manuals/docker-hub/image-library/mirror.md).

Also, Registry Access Management operates on the level of hosts, not IP
addresses. Developers can bypass this restriction within their domain
resolution, for example by running Docker against a local proxy or modifying
their operating system's `sts` file. Blocking these forms of manipulation is
outside the remit of Docker Desktop.

## More resources

- [Video: Hardened Desktop Registry Access Management](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9Z6WJdJC9A)
