Updating the Arr Stack

This guide covers how to update the services running in the arr-stack: Prowlarr, Radarr, Sonarr (TV), Sonarr (Anime), qBittorrent, and Seerr. All services run as Docker containers via Docker Compose on the arr-server VM.
The same pattern applies to every container in the stack — pull the new image, then recreate the container. This is generally safe: pulling doesn't touch anything running, and recreating only replaces containers whose image actually changed.
Step by step
1. Log in to the arr-server
ssh <user>@<arr-server>
2. Go to the compose directory (where 
docker-compose.yml lives)
cd ~/arr-stack
3. Pull the new images — this is safe, it only downloads, it doesn't touch the running containers
docker compose pull
To update only specific services, name them:
docker compose pull radarr sonarr-tv
4. Recreate the containers with the new image — this is where the brief downtime happens (usually well under a minute per service). Docker only recreates containers whose image actually changed:
docker compose up -d
Or for specific services only:
docker compose up -d radarr sonarr-tv
5. Verify everything is up and on the new version
docker compose ps
All services should show 
Up. Give them 30–60 seconds to fully initialize before checking further.
Check the version in each service's web UI (usually under Settings → General or the bottom of the sidebar), or via logs:
docker compose logs -f --tail=50
Updating everything at once
To update all six services in one go:
cd ~/arr-stack
docker compose pull
docker compose up -d
Service-specific notes
Service
Notes after updating
Prowlarr
Feeds indexers to Radarr and both Sonarr instances. After updating, check Settings → Apps to confirm all three still show as synced.
Radarr
Check Settings → Indexers still shows all indexers active.
Sonarr (TV) / Sonarr (Anime)
Two independent instances — update and verify separately. Confirm episode/series detection still works.
qBittorrent
Active torrents and settings persist across updates (stored in the config volume). Verify downloads/seeding resume normally.
Seerr
Stateless request frontend. Verify it can still reach Radarr/Sonarr and that a test request goes through.
Rolling back
If an update causes problems, you can pin back to the previous image.
Find the image ID/digest that was running before the update:
docker image ls --digests | grep <service-name>
(Do this before pulling if you think you might need to roll back — note the current digest first.)
Stop the affected service:
docker compose stop <service-name>
Temporarily pin the image in 
docker-compose.yml to the old digest:
radarr:
  image: lscr.io/linuxserver/radarr@sha256:<previous_digest>
Recreate with the pinned image:
docker compose up -d <service-name>
Once confirmed stable, either leave it pinned or revert the compose file to 
:latest and re-test later.
If config itself got corrupted by the update (not just the binary), restore the relevant folder from a backup of 
~/arr-stack/config/.
Backing up before updates
Config for every service lives under 
~/arr-stack/config/<service>/. A quick manual backup before a risky update:
tar -czf ~/arr-stack-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d-%H%M%S).tar.gz -C ~/arr-stack config/
If something won't come back up
Check the logs for that specific service:
docker compose logs <service-name>
Check disk space — a full disk is a common cause of failed startups:
df -h ~/arr-stack
Check config folder permissions look sane:
ls -la ~/arr-stack/config/
Try a plain restart before anything more drastic:
docker compose restart <service-name>
Update frequency
All images here track 
:latest, so there's no fixed release cadence to wait for — updates just mean whatever the maintainers shipped since your last pull.
For routine point releases, it's fine to just update.
For anything that looks like a major version bump in the release notes, skim the changelog first — Prowlarr/Radarr/Sonarr occasionally have schema or config-format changes worth knowing about ahead of time.
Further reading
LinuxServer.io image docs: https://docs.linuxserver.io/
Radarr releases: https://github.com/Radarr/Radarr/releases
Sonarr releases: https://github.com/Sonarr/Sonarr/releases
Prowlarr releases: https://github.com/Prowlarr/Prowlarr/releases
qBittorrent releases: https://github.com/qbittorrent/qBittorrent/releases
Seerr releases: https://github.com/seerr-team/seerr/releases