Before reading this article, I am assuming that you know Docker, Dotnet core and have a dotnet core application which is trying to connect to SQL server. Read how to build aspnet core app, docker and run the docker container. If docker container is running and you are not able to connect to database, this blog should help you fix it. Prerequisite - Make sure code is working via running aspnet core locally via visual studio or command line. Port 1433 is opened for connecting to SQL server. Solution If you have Docker file ready, it should somewhat look like below file - FROM mcr.microsoft.com/dotnet/core/sdk:3.1 AS build-env WORKDIR /app # Copy csproj and restore as distinct layers COPY /SampleAPI/*.csproj ./ RUN dotnet restore # Copy everything else and build COPY . . WORKDIR /app/SampleAPI RUN dotnet publish -c Production -o publish # Build runtime image FROM mcr.microsoft.com/dotnet/core/aspnet:3.1 WORKDIR /app/SampleAPI COPY --from=build-env /app/SampleAPI . WORK