Packer Templates

Packer's behavior is determined by the Packer template, which consists of a series of declarations and commands for Packer to follow. This template tells Packer what plugins (builders, provisioners, post-processors) to use, how to configure each of those plugins, and what order to run them in.

The template contains flexible variable injection tools, as well as built-in functions to help you customize your builds.

Historically, Packer has used a JSON template for its configuration, but Packer is transitioning to a new template configuration format that uses HCL2 -- the same configuration language used by Terraform and HashiCorp's other products. This format is more flexible, more modular, and more concise than the original JSON template format. While the JSON format is still supported, certain new features in the Packer core will only be implemented for the newer HCL format. Please use the side bar to find documentation for the different template formats.

From version 1.7.0, HCL2 becomes officially the preferred way to write Packer configuration(s).

If you need help upgrading a JSON template to an HCL template, check our upgrade guide here.