Overview
Kubernetes (K8s) is an open-source system for automating the deployment, scaling and management of containerised applications, grouping containers into logical units for management and discovery[12]. It builds on 15 years of Google’s experience running production workloads and follows the design principles that let Google run billions of containers a week[12]. It is a graduated project of the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF)[12].
Kubernetes runs on-premises, in hybrid environments and on every major public cloud, typically through managed services offered by cloud providers[12]. It is the deployment target for many tools in this list: Argo CD continuously reconciles Kubernetes clusters with Git, Harness and GitLab deploy to it, and Docker images are its usual workload format[13][8]. The software is free, but operating it requires significant expertise in networking, storage, security and upgrades, which is why most organisations use a managed distribution. For small applications, simpler platforms may be more economical.
What Kubernetes does
- Automated scheduling and scaling
- Self-healing workloads
- Service discovery and load balancing
- Declarative configuration
- Runs on-premises, hybrid or cloud
Kubernetes pricing
Free and open source; managed services from cloud providers charge for clusters and compute.
Kubernetes strengths and limitations
Strengths
- De facto container orchestration standard
- Portable across clouds
- Huge ecosystem
- Free
Limitations
- Steep learning curve
- Operational complexity
- Overkill for small apps
- Security configuration is demanding
Appears in
Kubernetes alternatives and competitors
Alternatives to Kubernetes: companies ranked in the same lists.
OpenAI Whisper
GitLab
Microsoft Azure AI Speech
Jira Service Management
Jenkins
Harness
CircleCI
Docker
Argo CD
HCP Terraform- Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform
Datadog
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