Installation

The fastest way to get Lychee running is with Docker Compose. A single command gets you a fully working gallery with a database, ready to use.

Download the minimal compose file and start Lychee:

curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/LycheeOrg/Lychee/master/docker-compose.minimal.yaml
docker compose -f docker-compose.minimal.yaml up -d

Lychee is now running at http://localhost:8000.

On first visit, you will be prompted to create an admin account.

The minimal compose file sets up:

• Lychee with FrankenPHP (the modern, high-performance runtime)
• MariaDB as the database
• Persistent storage for your photos and database

Once Lychee is running:

1. Create your admin account on first visit
2. Upload your first photos via the web interface
3. Configure your instance — see Configuration and Settings

For production deployments, you should:

• Set a proper APP_URL and APP_KEY — see Configuration
• Put Lychee behind a reverse proxy with TLS (nginx, Traefik, or Caddy)
• Use the full Docker Compose template with workers for better performance

If you cannot use Docker, Lychee can be installed manually on a server with PHP, a web server, and a database. See the Manual Installation guide.