DOCA Profiles
This document introduces and compares the different NVIDIA DOCA Host installation profiles, helping users select the most suitable configuration for their workloads and environments.
NVIDIA DOCA can be installed on host machines to support a range of NVIDIA BlueField DPUs and ConnectX SmartNICs. To meet the needs of different deployment scenarios, DOCA offers installation profiles—validated packages that streamline setup based on the desired functionality.
The following are the available DOCA profiles:
doca-all
doca-networking
doca-ofed
doca-roce
DOCA functionality is limited by the specific device capabilities.

The functionality of DOCA-Host is limited by the device capabilities (for example, ConnectX devices cannot utilize DOCA libraries such as DPA, even if doca-all
is installed on the host).
For BlueField devices:
NVIDIA recommends the
doca-all
profileIf you require the smallest installation package for networking-only purposes, use
doca-networking
For MLNX_OFED-like installations, use
doca-ofed
(no additional DOCA functionality)For RoCE functionality only, install
doca-roce
For ConnectX devices:
NVIDIA recommends the
doca-networking
profileFor deployments with both BlueField and ConnectX devices, use
doca-all
. This is also a good, scalable option for deployments that do not currently use both BlueField or ConnectX devices, but eventually might.For MLNX_OFED-like installation use
doca-ofed
(no additional DOCA functionality)For RoCE functionality only, install
doca-roce
doca-all
Purpose | Install the full DOCA suite, including all libraries, drivers, and tools |
Includes |
|
Recommended for |
|
Some components may require additional ,manual installation after the default package is installed.
doca-networking
Purpose | Networking-specific installation without full DOCA library overhead |
Includes |
|
Recommended for |
|
doca-ofed
Purpose | Driver-only installation equivalent to MLNX_OFED |
Includes |
|
Recommended for |
|
doca-roce
Purpose | Lightweight RDMA-over-Ethernet (RoCE) functionality |
Includes |
|
Recommended for |
|
All profiles support the following NVIDIA hardware:
BlueField-3
BlueField-2
ConnectX-8
ConnectX-7
ConnectX-6 DX / LX / standard
ConnectX-5
ConnectX-4 LX
DOCA functionality is limited by the specific device capabilities. For example, ConnectX devices cannot use certain DOCA libraries, such as DPA.
Each DOCA-Host profile is supported on a subset of operating systems. Refer to Supported Host OS per DOCA-Host Installation Profile for device-specific compatibility information. To install a profile, follow the installation steps in DOCA-Host Installation and Upgrade .