Image size reported larger when using Colima?

[Kevin-Molina]

With the alpine:3.21 image, I noticed:

With Docker for Mac, I get:
docker images -> 8.17MB
dive -> 8.2MB

When I use Colima (And set DOCKER_HOST=, I get:
docker images -> 12.8MB
dive -> 8.2MB

What's going on here / why the discrepancy?

[mg1986jp]

The size difference is probably because Colima's Docker daemon and Docker Desktop use different storage drivers. Docker Desktop on Mac typically uses overlay2 with VirtioFS, while Colima might be using a different combination depending on your VM type and filesystem setup.

Also, docker images reports the virtual size which can vary based on how layers are stored and deduped. The actual disk usage might be the same — check with docker system df on both to compare the real storage consumption.

If you're using vz VM type with virtiofs in Colima, the image metadata reporting can differ slightly from Docker Desktop's implementation. The underlying image data (layers) should be identical in size since they come from the same registry.

TL;DR: The images contain the same data, the size reporting just differs between the Docker daemons. Nothing to worry about.