Apache Kafka

What is Apache Kafka?

Apache Kafka is a distributed event-streaming platform for high-throughput publish/subscribe messaging, used for event pipelines, log aggregation, and decoupling services. Laradock's Kafka needs the zookeeper container running alongside it to manage broker coordination.

Start Kafka

docker compose up -d zookeeper kafka

Stop Kafka

docker compose stop kafka

This stops the container. To also stop ZooKeeper: docker compose stop kafka zookeeper.

Configuration

kafka/defaults.env is empty, all Kafka configuration is fixed directly in kafka/compose.yml rather than exposed as .env overrides:

Setting	Value	What it does
KAFKA_BROKER_ID	1	Unique ID for this broker in the cluster.
KAFKA_ADVERTISED_HOST_NAME	127.0.0.1	Hostname advertised to clients for connecting back.
KAFKA_ADVERTISED_LISTENERS	PLAINTEXT://127.0.0.1:9092	Listener address advertised to clients.
KAFKA_MESSAGE_MAX_BYTES	2000000	Maximum message size the broker accepts.
KAFKA_ZOOKEEPER_CONNECT	zookeeper:2181	ZooKeeper connection string.

The broker listens on port 9092 (mapped host:container in compose.yml, not driven by an env var). Kafka data is stored under DATA_PATH_HOST/kafka, and the container also mounts /var/run/docker.sock.

Manage Kafka from a web UI

Start Kafka Manager alongside it:

docker compose up -d kafka-manager

Open http://localhost:9020 and add a cluster pointing at the ZooKeeper host zookeeper:2181. See Kafka Manager for details.

Connect from your host machine

Inside Laradock, other containers reach the broker at kafka:9092. From your own machine, it's published on localhost:9092. Note KAFKA_ADVERTISED_HOST_NAME/KAFKA_ADVERTISED_LISTENERS are hardcoded to 127.0.0.1 in compose.yml, if you need clients on other machines on your network to connect, you'll need to edit those values directly.

Common issues

• Kafka won't start. It depends on ZooKeeper being up first; always start both together with docker compose up -d zookeeper kafka.
• Client can't produce/consume even though the container is running. Confirm your client is using kafka:9092 from inside another container, or localhost:9092 from your host, not a mix of the two.
• Message rejected as too large. Check KAFKA_MESSAGE_MAX_BYTES (fixed at 2000000 in compose.yml); anything bigger needs the compose file edited directly since it's not exposed via .env.
• Nothing shows up in Kafka Manager. Make sure zookeeper and kafka are both running before adding the cluster, and that you pointed the cluster form at zookeeper:2181, not kafka:9092.

---

Need a web UI for the cluster? See Kafka Manager. New to Laradock? Start at Getting Started.