diff --git a/cmd/dockerd/daemon.go b/cmd/dockerd/daemon.go
index c5f278a391..8565c54787 100644
--- a/cmd/dockerd/daemon.go
+++ b/cmd/dockerd/daemon.go
@@ -244,6 +244,17 @@ func (cli *daemonCLI) start(ctx context.Context) (err error) {
 
 	pluginStore := plugin.NewStore()
 
+	// Register the CDI driver before the daemon starts, as it might try to restore containers that depend on the CDI driver.
+	// Note that CDI is not inherently linux-specific, there are some linux-specific assumptions / implementations in the code that
+	// queries the properties of device on the host as well as performs the injection of device nodes and their access permissions into the OCI spec.
+	//
+	// In order to lift this restriction the following would have to be addressed:
+	// - Support needs to be added to the cdi package for injecting Windows devices: https://tags.cncf.io/container-device-interface/issues/28
+	// - The DeviceRequests API must be extended to non-linux platforms.
+	if runtime.GOOS == "linux" && cli.Config.Features["cdi"] {
+		daemon.RegisterCDIDriver(cli.Config.CDISpecDirs...)
+	}
+
 	var apiServer apiserver.Server
 	cli.authzMiddleware, err = initMiddlewares(ctx, &apiServer, cli.Config, pluginStore)
 	if err != nil {
@@ -262,16 +273,6 @@ func (cli *daemonCLI) start(ctx context.Context) (err error) {
 		return errors.Wrap(err, "failed to validate authorization plugin")
 	}
 
-	// Note that CDI is not inherently linux-specific, there are some linux-specific assumptions / implementations in the code that
-	// queries the properties of device on the host as well as performs the injection of device nodes and their access permissions into the OCI spec.
-	//
-	// In order to lift this restriction the following would have to be addressed:
-	// - Support needs to be added to the cdi package for injecting Windows devices: https://tags.cncf.io/container-device-interface/issues/28
-	// - The DeviceRequests API must be extended to non-linux platforms.
-	if runtime.GOOS == "linux" && cli.Config.Features["cdi"] {
-		daemon.RegisterCDIDriver(cli.Config.CDISpecDirs...)
-	}
-
 	cli.d = d
 
 	if err := startMetricsServer(cli.Config.MetricsAddress); err != nil {