---
title: "Open WebUI with Ollama — Open WebUI on Desktop Spark"
canonical: "https://build.nvidia.com/spark/open-webui/instructions.md"
---

# Step 1. Configure Docker permissions

You should first make sure you can run Docker commands without entering your sudo password. 

To test that, open a terminal on the Spark and run:

```bash
docker ps > /dev/null
```

**Success**: If the command returns a blank, then skip ahead to Step 2.

Otherwise, you will see a permission denied error, which means you still need to remove the sudo requirement.
To do that, add your user to the docker group with the commands below.

```bash
sudo usermod -aG docker $USER
newgrp docker
```

Then verify the change is set by testing Docker access again with the command:

```bash
docker ps > /dev/null
```

# Step 2. Download the Open WebUI container image

Pull the container image onto your Spark with the command:

```bash
docker pull ghcr.io/open-webui/open-webui:ollama
```

Wait for the image to download, then go to Step 3.

# Step 3. Start the Open WebUI container

Start the Open WebUI container by running:

```bash
docker run -d -p 8080:8080 --gpus=all \
-v open-webui:/app/backend/data \
-v open-webui-ollama:/root/.ollama \
--name open-webui ghcr.io/open-webui/open-webui:ollama
```

This will start the Open WebUI container and make it accessible at `http://localhost:8080`. You can access the Open WebUI interface from your local web browser.

> [!NOTE]
> Application data will be stored in the `open-webui` volume and model data will be stored in the `open-webui-ollama` volume.

# Step 4. Create administrator account

Set up the initial administrator account for Open WebUI. This is a local account that you will use to access the Open WebUI interface.

- In the Open WebUI interface, click the "Get Started" button at the bottom of the screen.
- Fill out the administrator account creation form with your preferred credentials.
- Click the registration button to create your account and access the main interface.

# Step 5. Download and configure a model

You'll then download a language model through Ollama and configure it for use in
Open WebUI. This download happens on your DGX Spark device and may take several minutes.

- Click on the "Select a model" dropdown in the top left corner of the Open WebUI interface.
- Type `gpt-oss:20b` in the search field.
- Click the "Pull 'gpt-oss:20b' from Ollama.com" button that appears.
- Wait for the model download to complete. You can monitor progress in the interface.
- Once complete, select "gpt-oss:20b" from the model dropdown.

# Step 6. Test the model

You can verify that the setup is working properly by testing model
inference through the web interface.

- In the chat text area at the bottom of the Open WebUI interface, enter: **Write me a haiku about GPUs**.
- Press Enter to send the message and wait for the model's response.

# Step 7. Next steps

Try downloading different models from the Ollama library at https://ollama.com/library.

You can try this [set up with NVIDIA Sync](/spark/open-webui/sync) so that you can monitor GPU and memory usage through the DGX Dashboard as you try different models.

If Open WebUI reports an update is available, you can update the container image by running:

```bash
docker pull ghcr.io/open-webui/open-webui:ollama
```

# Step 8. Cleanup and rollback

Steps to completely remove the Open WebUI installation and free up resources.

> [!WARNING]
> These commands will permanently delete all Open WebUI data and downloaded models.

Stop and remove the Open WebUI container:

```bash
docker stop open-webui
docker rm open-webui
```

Remove the downloaded images:

```bash
docker rmi ghcr.io/open-webui/open-webui:ollama
```

Remove persistent data volumes:

```bash
docker volume rm open-webui open-webui-ollama
```