[Bug] NetBox container fails to connect to Postgres on ARM64 (Raspberry Pi)

[narfwolf]

Current Behavior

I am trying to run the netbox-docker stack on a Raspberry Pi 5 (ARM64/aarch64 architecture). When I run docker compose up, the postgres and redis containers start correctly, but the netbox container fails to connect to the database.

It gets stuck in a loop, printing ⏳ Waiting on DB... and eventually times out with the error ❌ Waited 30s or more for the DB to become ready., even though the postgres container logs show it is ready to accept connections.

This failure occurs even when using a minimal docker-compose.yml and attempting to connect via service name, container name, or even a hardcoded static IP address for the database.

Expected Behavior

I expected that the netbox container would successfully connect to the postgres container on the shared Docker network, proceed to run the database migrations, and start the web server, making the NetBox UI accessible.

Docker Compose Version

Docker Compose version v2.36.2

Docker Version

Client: Docker Engine - Community
 Version:           28.2.2
 API version:       1.50
 Go version:        go1.24.3
 Git commit:        e6534b4
 Built:             Fri May 30 12:07:27 2025
 OS/Arch:           linux/arm64
 Context:           default

Server: Docker Engine - Community
 Engine:
  Version:          28.2.2
  API version:      1.50 (minimum version 1.24)
  Go version:       go1.24.3
  Git commit:       45873be
  Built:            Fri May 30 12:07:27 2025
  OS/Arch:          linux/arm64
  Experimental:     false
 containerd:
  Version:          1.7.27
  GitCommit:        05044ec0a9a75232cad458027ca83437aae3f4da
 runc:
  Version:          1.2.5
  GitCommit:        v1.2.5-0-g59923ef
 docker-init:
  Version:          0.19.0
  GitCommit:        de40ad0

The git Revision

N/A

The git Status

N/A

Startup Command

docker compose up

NetBox Logs

netbox           | Waiting for 10 seconds before starting...
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (0s / 30s)
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (3s / 30s)
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (6s / 30s)
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (9s / 30s)
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (12s / 30s)
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (15s / 30s)
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (18s / 30s)
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (21s / 30s)
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (24s / 30s)
netbox           |   python /opt/netbox/netbox/generate_secret_key.py
netbox           | [ Use DB_WAIT_DEBUG=1 in netbox.env to print full traceback for errors here ]
netbox           | ⏳ Waiting on DB... (27s / 30s)
netbox           | ❌ Waited 30s or more for the DB to become ready.
netbox exited with code 0

Content of docker-compose.override.yml

N/A

[narfwolf]

Additional Diagnostic Steps Taken
To isolate the cause, I performed several diagnostic tests:

1. Verified Host Docker Networking: I created a separate user-defined network and launched two containers (nginx and nicolaka/netshoot). From inside the netshoot container, I was able to successfully resolve and ping the nginx container by its hostname. This proves that Docker's internal DNS and networking are functioning correctly on the host system.

2. Failure with Static IP: I modified the docker-compose.yml to assign a static IP to the postgres container and configured the netbox container's DB_HOST to use this IP. The connection still failed with the same timeout error. This indicates the issue is not with DNS resolution but with the netbox container's ability to initiate any network connection to the database container.

These steps strongly suggest the bug is an incompatibility within the netboxcommunity/netbox:latest image specifically on the aarch64 architecture, rather than an issue with the host environment.