This guide covers the installation of Wings on your server. Wings is distributed as a single binary that can be downloaded from GitHub releases.
Prerequisites Before installing Wings, ensure you have:
Installed Docker
Docker must be installed and running on your system
Root or Sudo Access
Installation requires root privileges
Installation Methods Wings can be installed using several methods:
Download the pre-compiled binary from GitHub releases. Download Latest Release # Create installation directory sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/bin # Download Wings (AMD64) sudo curl -L -o /usr/local/bin/wings "https://github.com/pterodactyl/wings/releases/latest/download/wings_linux_amd64" # Make it executable sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/wings
For ARM64 systems, use the ARM64 binary: sudo curl -L -o /usr/local/bin/wings "https://github.com/pterodactyl/wings/releases/latest/download/wings_linux_arm64" sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/wings
Run Wings in a Docker container using the official image. Using Docker Compose Create a docker-compose.yml file: version : '3.8' services : wings : image : ghcr.io/pterodactyl/wings:latest restart : always networks : - wings0 ports : - "8080:8080" - "2022:2022" tty : true environment : TZ : "UTC" WINGS_UID : 988 WINGS_GID : 988 WINGS_USERNAME : pterodactyl volumes : - "/var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock" - "/var/lib/docker/containers/:/var/lib/docker/containers/" - "/etc/pterodactyl/:/etc/pterodactyl/" - "/var/lib/pterodactyl/:/var/lib/pterodactyl/" - "/var/log/pterodactyl/:/var/log/pterodactyl/" - "/tmp/pterodactyl/:/tmp/pterodactyl/" - "/etc/ssl/certs:/etc/ssl/certs:ro" - "/run/wings:/run/wings" networks : wings0 : name : wings0 driver : bridge ipam : config : - subnet : "172.21.0.0/16" driver_opts : com.docker.network.bridge.name : wings0
Start Wings: Build Wings from source code. Requirements
Go 1.24.0 or higher
Git
Make
Build Steps # Install Go (if not installed) # Visit https://golang.org/doc/install # Clone the repository git clone https://github.com/pterodactyl/wings.git cd wings # Build for your architecture make build # The binary will be in build/wings_linux_amd64 sudo cp build/wings_linux_amd64 /usr/local/bin/wings sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/wings
Verify Installation Check that Wings is installed correctly:
You should see output similar to:
wings v1.12.1 Copyright © 2018 - 2026 Dane Everitt & Contributors
Create Required Directories Wings requires several directories to operate. Create them manually:
# Create configuration directory sudo mkdir -p /etc/pterodactyl # Create data directories sudo mkdir -p /var/lib/pterodactyl/volumes sudo mkdir -p /var/lib/pterodactyl/backups sudo mkdir -p /var/lib/pterodactyl/archives # Create log directory sudo mkdir -p /var/log/pterodactyl # Create temporary directory sudo mkdir -p /tmp/pterodactyl # Create runtime directories sudo mkdir -p /run/wings/etc sudo mkdir -p /run/wings/machine-id
Wings automatically creates these directories on startup (see config/config.go:629), but creating them manually ensures proper permissions.
Set Up Systemd Service For production use, configure Wings to run as a systemd service.
Create Service File Create /etc/systemd/system/wings.service:
/etc/systemd/system/wings.service
[Unit] Description =Pterodactyl Wings Daemon After =docker.service Requires =docker.service PartOf =docker.service [Service] User =root WorkingDirectory =/etc/pterodactyl LimitNOFILE =4096 PIDFile =/var/run/wings/daemon.pid ExecStart =/usr/local/bin/wings Restart =on-failure StartLimitInterval =180 StartLimitBurst =30 RestartSec =5s [Install] WantedBy =multi-user.target
Wings must run as root to manage Docker containers and create the pterodactyl system user (see config/config.go:480).
Enable and Start Service # Reload systemd sudo systemctl daemon-reload # Enable Wings to start on boot sudo systemctl enable wings # Start Wings (after configuration) # sudo systemctl start wings
Do not start Wings yet! You need to configure it first. See Configuration . Alternative Service Configurations Using Systemd Credentials For enhanced security, use systemd’s credential loading (see config/config.go:841):
/etc/systemd/system/wings.service
[Unit] Description =Pterodactyl Wings Daemon After =docker.service Requires =docker.service [Service] User =root WorkingDirectory =/etc/pterodactyl LimitNOFILE =4096 PIDFile =/var/run/wings/daemon.pid ExecStart =/usr/local/bin/wings Restart =on-failure StartLimitInterval =180 StartLimitBurst =30 RestartSec =5s # Load credentials from files LoadCredential =token_id:/etc/pterodactyl/credentials/token_id LoadCredential =token:/etc/pterodactyl/credentials/token [Install] WantedBy =multi-user.target
Then in your configuration file, reference the credentials:
token_id : 'file://${CREDENTIALS_DIRECTORY}/token_id' token : 'file://${CREDENTIALS_DIRECTORY}/token'
Wings automatically configures log rotation if logrotate is available (see config/config.go:695). To manually verify:
# Check if logrotate configuration was created cat /etc/logrotate.d/wings
The automatic configuration:
Rotates logs at 10 MB
Compresses old logs
Keeps logs for 7 days
Sends HUP signal to Wings on rotation
Testing the Installation Before configuring Wings, test that it runs:
Available commands:
Command Description wingsStart the Wings daemon wings versionDisplay version information wings configureAuto-configure from Panel wings diagnosticsGenerate diagnostic report
Useful Flags Flag Description --config <path>Specify config file location (default: /etc/pterodactyl/config.yml) --debugEnable debug mode --auto-tlsEnable automatic Let’s Encrypt SSL --tls-hostname <hostname>Hostname for auto-TLS
Troubleshooting Installation
Ensure the Wings binary is executable: sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/wings
Wings requires Docker to be installed and running: # Check Docker status sudo systemctl status docker # Start Docker if needed sudo systemctl start docker
Verify you downloaded the correct architecture: # Check system architecture uname -m # Should be x86_64 for amd64 or aarch64 for arm64
Check the service status and logs: # View service status sudo systemctl status wings # View logs sudo journalctl -u wings -n 50
Next Steps
Configuration Configure Wings for your environment
Panel Configuration Set up Wings in your Panel
