Your Docker image is 5 GB? Here is how to get it down to 50 MB.

Step 1: Measure¶

docker images myapp docker history myapp:latest

Step 2: Alpine Base¶

Docker Image: From 5 GB to 50 MB¶

FROM node:20-alpine # → 180 MB

Step 3: Multi-stage Build¶

FROM node:20-alpine AS build WORKDIR /app COPY package*.json ./ RUN npm ci –production COPY . . RUN npm run build

FROM node:20-alpine COPY –from=build /app/dist ./dist COPY –from=build /app/node_modules ./node_modules CMD [“node”, “dist/index.js”]

Step 4: Distroless¶

FROM gcr.io/distroless/nodejs20-debian12 COPY –from=build /app/dist /app CMD [“/app/index.js”]

Step 5: .dockerignore¶

node_modules .git *.md Dockerfile tests

Step 6: Minimize Layers¶

RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y curl && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*

Results¶

• node:20 = 1.1 GB
• node:20-alpine = 180 MB
• Multi-stage + alpine = 80 MB
• Distroless = 50 MB
• Go static binary + scratch = 10 MB

Tip¶

Smaller image = faster deploy, less attack surface, less storage. Always worth it.