nerdctl is a relatively new command-line client for containerd. Unlike ctr, nerdctl aims to be user-friendly and Docker-compatible. To some extent, nerdctl + containerd can seamlessly replace docker + dockerd. However, this does not seem to be the main goal of the project.

From the basic usage standpoint, comparing to ctr, nerdctl supports:

• Image building with nerdctl build (BuildKit required)
• Container networking management
• Docker Compose with nerdctl compose up

And the coolest part about it is that nerdctl tries to provide the identical to docker (and podman) command-line UX. So, if you are familiar with docker (or podman) CLI, you are already familiar with nerdctl.

nerdctl run -d -p 8080:80 --name nginx-1 nginx

You can stop (and remove) the container using the familiar Docker syntax:

nerdctl stop nginx-1
nerdctl rm nginx-1