docker scout compare

Description Compare two images and display differences (experimental)
Usage docker scout compare --to IMAGE|DIRECTORY|ARCHIVE [IMAGE|DIRECTORY|ARCHIVE]
Aliases
docker scout diff

Experimental

This command is experimental.

Experimental features are intended for testing and feedback as their functionality or design may change between releases without warning or can be removed entirely in a future release.

Description

The docker scout compare command analyzes two images and displays a comparison.

This command is experimental and its behaviour might change in the future

The intended use of this command is to compare two versions of the same image. For instance, when a new image is built and compared to the version running in production.

If no image is specified, the most recently built image is used as a comparison target.

The following artifact types are supported:

  • Images
  • OCI layout directories
  • Tarball archives, as created by docker save
  • Local directory or file

By default, the tool expects an image reference, such as:

  • redis
  • curlimages/curl:7.87.0
  • mcr.microsoft.com/dotnet/runtime:7.0

If the artifact you want to analyze is an OCI directory, a tarball archive, a local file or directory, or if you want to control from where the image will be resolved, you must prefix the reference with one of the following:

  • image:// (default) use a local image, or fall back to a registry lookup
  • local:// use an image from the local image store (don't do a registry lookup)
  • registry:// use an image from a registry (don't use a local image)
  • oci-dir:// use an OCI layout directory
  • archive:// use a tarball archive, as created by docker save
  • fs:// use a local directory or file
  • sbom:// SPDX file or in-toto attestation file with SPDX predicate or syft json SBOM file

Options

Option Default Description
-x, --exit-on Comma separated list of conditions to fail the action step if worse, options are: vulnerability, policy
--format text Output format of the generated vulnerability report:
- text: default output, plain text with or without colors depending on the terminal
- markdown: Markdown output
--hide-policies Hide policy status from the output
--ignore-base Filter out CVEs introduced from base image
--ignore-unchanged Filter out unchanged packages
--multi-stage Show packages from multi-stage Docker builds
--only-fixed Filter to fixable CVEs
--only-package-type Comma separated list of package types (like apk, deb, rpm, npm, pypi, golang, etc)
--only-policy Comma separated list of policies to evaluate
--only-severity Comma separated list of severities (critical, high, medium, low, unspecified) to filter CVEs by
--only-stage Comma separated list of multi-stage Docker build stage names
--only-unfixed Filter to unfixed CVEs
--org Namespace of the Docker organization
-o, --output Write the report to a file
--platform Platform of image to analyze
--ref Reference to use if the provided tarball contains multiple references.
Can only be used with archive
--to Image, directory, or archive to compare to
--to-env Name of environment to compare to
--to-latest Latest image processed to compare to
--to-ref Reference to use if the provided tarball contains multiple references.
Can only be used with archive.

Examples

Compare the most recently built image to the latest tag 

$ docker scout compare --to namespace/repo:latest

Compare local build to the same tag from the registry 

$ docker scout compare local://namespace/repo:latest --to registry://namespace/repo:latest

Ignore base images 

$ docker scout compare --ignore-base --to namespace/repo:latest namespace/repo:v1.2.3-pre

Generate a markdown output 

$ docker scout compare --format markdown --to namespace/repo:latest namespace/repo:v1.2.3-pre

Only compare maven packages and only display critical vulnerabilities for maven packages 

$ docker scout compare --only-package-type maven --only-severity critical --to namespace/repo:latest namespace/repo:v1.2.3-pre

Show all policy results for both images 

docker scout compare --to namespace/repo:latest namespace/repo:v1.2.3-pre