ZFS Storage

Configure Podman to use ZFS on FreeBSD for container storage.

Default Storage

By default, Podman uses /var/db/containers with the vfs storage driver.

Configure ZFS Driver

Edit /usr/local/etc/containers/storage.conf:

[storage]
driver = "zfs"
graphroot = "/var/db/containers/storage"

[storage.options.zfs]
mountopt = "nodev"

Create ZFS Dataset

# Create dataset for container storage
zfs create zroot/containers
zfs set mountpoint=/var/db/containers/storage zroot/containers

# Optional: enable compression
zfs set compression=lz4 zroot/containers

Benefits

Feature	Benefit
Copy-on-write	Fast container creation
Snapshots	Easy backup/restore
Compression	Smaller storage footprint
Checksums	Data integrity

Separate Config Storage

Keep container configs on a separate dataset for easy backup:

zfs create zroot/data/config
zfs set mountpoint=/data/config zroot/data/config

# Snapshot before upgrades
zfs snapshot zroot/data/config@before-upgrade

Troubleshooting

Permission Issues

# Ensure correct ownership
chown -R root:wheel /var/db/containers

Reset Storage

# Stop all containers first
podman stop -a
podman system reset