How to profile JVM running on a remote server docker container.

On a Ubuntu desktop install JProfiler GUI from here.

Download script and run it.
http://download-keycdn.ej-technologies.com/jprofiler/jprofiler_linux_9_2.sh

Provide key if you have , else use evaluation.

Now on the Ubuntu server where docker container is running, you need to stop containers first and modify Dockerfile to add jprofiler

wget http://download-keycdn.ej-technologies.com/jprofiler/jprofiler_linux_9_2.tar.gz && \
tar -xzf jprofiler_linux_9_1_1.tar.gz -C /usr/local

Also expose the port 8849 from container to host so that you can connect from your desktop.

If you use docker-compose.yml, map the port in the service , which you want to connect.
For example

version: "2"
services:
  some_service:
    build: .
    ports:
      - "8849:8849"
    depends_on:
      - "db"
    entrypoint:


This will download jprofiler 9.2 and unpack it in /usr/local when you run docker container next time and map the port on host server.

Once docker container is up , you can ssh to it
docker exec -it /bin/bash
And just start the jprofiler using following command.
/usr/local/jprofiler9/bin/jpenable
You will be asked for 2 options , 1) GUI connect 2. Using config.xml

Use option 1 GUI connect
Now from Desktop you can open JProfiler UI and connect to server-ip:8849
You can profile the JVM you want.