The multipass launch command without any argument will create and start a new instance based on the default image, using a random generated name; for example:
…
Launched: relishing-lionfish
You can then shell into an instance by its name:
multipass shell relishing-lionfish
The only, optional, positional argument is the image to launch an instance from. See find for how to find information on the available images.
It’s also possible to provide a full URL to the image (use file:// for an image available on the host running multipassd).
You can change the resources made available to the instance by passing the --cpus, --disk or --memory options, changing the allocated CPU cores, disk space or RAM, respectively.
If you want your instance to have a name of your choice, use the --name option. The instance name has to be unique and conform to a specific instance name format.
By passing a filename or an URL to --cloud-init, you can provide user data to cloud-init to customize the instance on first boot. See cloud-init documentation for examples.
Use the --network option to create an instance with additional network interfaces.
Passing --bridged and --network bridged are shortcuts to --network <name>, where <name> is configured via multipass set local.bridged-interface.
You can also mount folders in the instance after it is launched using the --mount option. It can be specified multiple times, with different mount paths.
Use the --timeout option to change how long Multipass waits for the machine to boot and initialize.
The full multipass help launch output explains the available options:
Usage: multipass launch [options] [[<remote:>]<image> | <url>]
Create and start a new instance.
Options:
-h, --help Displays help on commandline options
-v, --verbose Increase logging verbosity. Repeat the
'v' in the short option for more detail.
Maximum verbosity is obtained with 4 (or
more) v's, i.e. -vvvv.
-c, --cpus <cpus> Number of CPUs to allocate.
Minimum: 1, default: 1.
-d, --disk <disk> Disk space to allocate. Positive
integers, in bytes, or decimals, with K,
M, G suffix.
Minimum: 512M, default: 5G.
-m, --memory <memory> Amount of memory to allocate. Positive
integers, in bytes, or decimals, with K,
M, G suffix.
Minimum: 128M, default: 1G.
-n, --name <name> Name for the instance. If it is
'primary' (the configured primary
instance name), the user's home
directory is mounted inside the newly
launched instance, in 'Home'.
Valid names must consist of letters,
numbers, or hyphens, must start with a
letter, and must end with an
alphanumeric character.
--cloud-init <file> | <url> Path or URL to a user-data cloud-init
configuration, or '-' for stdin
--network <spec> Add a network interface to the
instance, where <spec> is in the
"key=value,key=value" format, with the
following keys available:
name: the network to connect to
(required), use the networks command for
a list of possible values, or use
'bridged' to use the interface
configured via `multipass set
local.bridged-network`.
mode: auto|manual (default: auto)
mac: hardware address (default:
random).
You can also use a shortcut of "<name>"
to mean "name=<name>".
--bridged Adds one `--network bridged` network.
--mount <local-path>:<instance-path> Mount a local directory inside the
instance. If <target> is omitted,
the mount point will be under
/home/ubuntu/<source-dir>, where
<source-dir> is the name of the
<source> directory.
--timeout <timeout> Maximum time, in seconds, to wait for
the command to complete. Note that some
background operations may continue
beyond that. By default, instance
startup and initialization is limited to
5 minutes each.
Arguments:
image Optional image to launch. If omitted,
then the default Ubuntu LTS will be
used.
<remote> can be either ‘release’ or
‘daily‘. If <remote> is omitted,
‘release’ will be used.
<image> can be a partial image hash or
an Ubuntu release version, codename or
alias.
<url> is a custom image URL that is in
http://, https://, or file:// format.
Errors or typos? Topics missing? Hard to read? Let us know or open an issue on GitHub.