# exposedbydefault not working?

**URL:** <https://community.traefik.io/t/exposedbydefault-not-working/29884>\
**Category:** Traefik v3 (latest)\
**Tags:** docker-swarm\
**Created:** [May 17, 2026, 7:01am UTC](https://community.traefik.io/t/exposedbydefault-not-working/29884 "2026-05-17T07:01:33Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![revenue-open](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/4af34b/32.png) [@revenue-open](https://community.traefik.io/u/revenue-open)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2026, 7:01am UTC](https://community.traefik.io/t/exposedbydefault-not-working/29884/1 "2026-05-17T07:01:33Z")

</div>

I am using Traefik with Docker Swarm. Everything seems to be working well except that it appears to be automatically picking up and exposing services including those I don't specify with labels.

I have the following config:

```yml
services:
  traefik:
    deploy:
      labels:
        - 'traefik.enable=true'
        - 'traefik.http.routers.my-traefik-dashboard-router.tls=true'
        - 'traefik.http.routers.my-traefik-dashboard-router.rule=Host(`traefik.example.com`)'
        - 'traefik.http.routers.my-traefik-dashboard-router.service=api@internal'
        - 'traefik.http.routers.my-traefik-dashboard-router.entrypoints=websecure'
        - 'traefik.http.routers.my-traefik-dashboard-router.middlewares=my-traefik-middleware@swarm'
        - 'traefik.http.middlewares.my-traefik-middleware.basicauth.usersfile=/run/secrets/traefik-users'
        # # Dummy service for Swarm port detection. The port can be any valid integer value.
        - 'traefik.http.services.dummy-svc.loadbalancer.server.port=9999'
      restart_policy:
        condition: 'any'
    logging:
      driver: 'json-file'
      options:
        max-size: '10m'
        max-file: '3'
    # https://hub.docker.com/_/traefik/tags
    image: 'traefik:v3.7.1@sha256:6b9cbca6fac42ab0075f5437d8dc1685cfd188626d8d515839ea94f8b6271c42'
    command:
        - '--providers.docker=true'
        - '--providers.file.filename=/traefik-config.yml' # CLI or environment configuration is preferred, but traefik only lets you set the TLS certificate paths via file configurtion
        - '--providers.swarm.endpoint=unix:///var/run/docker.sock'
        - '--providers.swarm.watch=true'
        - '--providers.swarm.exposedbydefault=false'
        - '--providers.swarm.network=traefik'
        - '--entryPoints.websecure.address=:443'
        - '--entrypoints.websecure.http.tls=true'
        - '--entrypoints.web.address=:80'
        - '--entrypoints.web.http.redirections.entrypoint.to=websecure'
        - '--entrypoints.web.http.redirections.entrypoint.scheme=https'
        - '--entrypoints.web.http.redirections.entrypoint.permanent=true'
        - '--api.dashboard=true'
        - '--api.insecure=false'
    networks:
      - 'traefik'

```

In the Traefik logs I'm seeing an attempt to expose a service that shouldn't be exposed:

```auto
ERR error="service \"portainer-agent-0xetch9eyinmqf4c6oxjwdchv-zphgr1uyt07ng4fveaxp3se13\" error: port is missing" container=portainer-agent-0xetch9eyinmqf4c6oxjwdchv-zphgr1uyt07ng4fveaxp3se13-54ad46201179b89d2a5e3f28d3fc58890e86dcc4ba02ffe0e8dad5be89aee6e4 providerName=docker

```

Also, on the traefik dashboard I see a bunch of what appear to be auto-generated services that should not be exposed.

Why isn't `--providers.swarm.exposedbydefault=false` working? I copied it directly out of the docs and the docs say that it should stop exactly this problem from happening.

The docs show `exposedByDefault` in some places and `exposedbydefault` in other places and an older thread said switching to `exposedbydefault` fixed their problem, but I have tried both and they both have the same symptoms.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![revenue-open](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/4af34b/32.png) [@revenue-open](https://community.traefik.io/u/revenue-open)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2026, 7:17am UTC](https://community.traefik.io/t/exposedbydefault-not-working/29884/2 "2026-05-17T07:17:12Z")

</div>

My issue ended up being that `--providers.docker=true` should not be set when using Swarm. It would be nice if non-sensical parameter combinations threw a clear error rather than trying to guess what the user meant. In this case, it apparently doesn't make sense to have both `providers.docker=true` and `providers.swarm.*` in combination, and setting the first causes the latter to be ignored.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/uploads/containo/original/2X/b/bd81ebdb578656e76e56ff3cc3eed021d3ba132d.png) [@system](https://community.traefik.io/u/system)\
**Post date:** [May 20, 2026, 7:17am UTC](https://community.traefik.io/t/exposedbydefault-not-working/29884/3 "2026-05-20T07:17:53Z")

</div>

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