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Asked: 2012-09-21 23:01:05 +0800 CST

dnsmasq: failed to create listening socket for port 53: Address already in use

  • 772

I was setting up a server as in the below link https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Dnsmasq

root@user-desktop:/etc/init.d# sudo apt-get install dnsmasq
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  dnsmasq
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/15.4 kB of archives.
After this operation, 120 kB of additional disk space will be used.
Selecting previously unselected package dnsmasq.
(Reading database ... 146283 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking dnsmasq (from .../dnsmasq_2.59-4_all.deb) ...
Processing triggers for ureadahead ...
Setting up dnsmasq (2.59-4) ...
 * Starting DNS forwarder and DHCP server dnsmasq                                                                                                                                                            
dnsmasq: failed to create listening socket for port 53: Address already in use [fail]
invoke-rc.d: initscript dnsmasq, action "start" failed.
dnsmasq

5 Answers

  1. Check what's listening on port 53 (domain) with:

    sudo ss -lp "sport = :domain"

    Disable any service that is running on this port. It's usually systemd-resolved.

    Here I make sure that you have stopped the systemd-resolved service. I'm going to also mask it so it doesn't auto start on reboot.

    sudo systemctl stop systemd-resolved
sudo systemctl disable systemd-resolved
sudo systemctl mask systemd-resolved

    To undo what you did:

    sudo systemctl unmask systemd-resolved
sudo systemctl enable systemd-resolved
sudo systemctl start systemd-resolved

    Also sudo update-rc.d systemd-resolved disable might also stop it from auto starting on boot but I haven't tested it. Use defaults instead of disable to undo the command.

    Note that systemd-resolved is an important component for name resolution. If you don't have any name resolution service properly running and configured you might encounter Temporary failure in name resolution.

    Or you can change what port dnsmasq listens on, by editing the config file:

    sudo nano /etc/dnsmasq.conf

    Hit Ctrl+W and type listen-address= and hit enter.

    Uncomment the line and add 127.0.0.1 with a different port than 53 like:

    listen-address=127.0.0.1#5300
    • 50

  2. I get the same issue as you do. I think that it's true since 12.10, but this thread was closed before the release of 12.10.

    Making some googling around (mostly inspired from here), I found this solution:

    • edit /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf file with you lovest editor
    • comment the line dns=dnsmasq
    • restart the network manager : sudo service network-manager restart

    But in your dnsmasq configuration (/etc/dnsmasq.conf), you have to be sure to listen the localhost DNS queries with the line listen-address=127.0.0.1.

    If you change the configuration of dnsmasq, don't forget to run sudo /etc/init.d/dnsmasq restart

    I hope this will help.

    • 11

  3. I had the same problem.

    dnsmasq-base was installed and listened on port 53 preventing dnsmasq to start.

    It is possible to use dnsmasq-base insead of dnsmasq for the same purpose: just use another config directory: the one placed in Network Manager folder:

    /etc/NetworkManager/dnsmasq.d/
    • 6

  4. If you don't want to screw up the resolver do it like this with rc.local.

    Stop dnsmasq from auto starting.

    servicectl disable dnsmasq

    Create file /etc/rc.local or /etc/rc.d/rc.local depending on distro.

    Set perms chmod +x /etc/rc.local

    Edit file:

    #!/bin/bash
service systemd-resolved stop
service dnsmasq start

    Disabling systemd-resolved on startup comes with issues. I believe it has something to do with the /etc/resolv.conf file but I'm not sure. All I know is that the first answer caused me a lot of problems and ultimately did not work at all. Simply stopping systemd-resolved then starting dnsmasq after full boot works perfect, at least on Mint. I can't speak on other distros.

    • 1

  5. try this: sudo fuser -k 53/tcp it will print you the process id of process bound on that port then kill it using: sudo kill -9 process-id

    • 1