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Rancher Labs Reviews

Vendor: Rancher Labs
4.2 out of 5
471 followers
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What is Rancher Labs?

Rancher Labs build innovative, open source software that makes it easy to deploy and manage containers in production on any infrastructure. We enable organizations to accelerate all aspects of their software development pipeline, from writing and testing code to running complex microservices-based applications.

Get the Rancher Labs Buyer's Guide and find out what your peers are saying about Rancher Labs, VMware Tanzu Platform, Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform and more!
Rancher Labs is the #3 ranked solution in top Data Storage for Kubernetes solutions and #6 ranked solution in Container Management software. PeerSpot users give Rancher Labs an average rating of 8.4 out of 10. Rancher Labs is most commonly compared to VMware Tanzu Platform: Rancher Labs vs VMware Tanzu Platform. Rancher Labs is popular among the large enterprise segment, accounting for 54% of users researching this solution on PeerSpot. The top industry researching this solution are professionals from a manufacturing company, accounting for 25% of all views.
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Rancher Labs
March 2025
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Rancher Labs mindshare

Product category:
Container Management
As of March 2025, the mindshare of Rancher Labs in the Container Management category stands at 9.4%, down from 10.3% compared to the previous year, according to calculations based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Container Management

PeerAnalyst reports based on Rancher Labs reviews

TypeTitleDate
CategoryContainer ManagementMar 30, 2025Download
ProductReviews, tips, and advice from real usersMar 30, 2025Download
ComparisonRancher Labs vs Red Hat OpenShift Container PlatformMar 30, 2025Download
ComparisonRancher Labs vs Amazon EKSMar 30, 2025Download
ComparisonRancher Labs vs VMware Tanzu PlatformMar 30, 2025Download
Suggested products
TitleRatingMindshareRecommending
VMware Tanzu Platform4.0N/A100%21 interviewsAdd to research
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform4.223.7%96%49 interviewsAdd to research
 
 
Key learnings from peers

Valuable Features

Rancher Labs offers a highly user-friendly interface enabling easy deployment and management of containers. It provides efficient log management, persistent storage integration for Kubernetes, and allows seamless scalability. The open-source nature prevents vendor lock-in, making it versatile across resources. Its comprehensive support includes features like Rancher Fleet for GitOps functionality and Harvester for managing virtual machines. Compatibility with various OEMs and intuitive GUI access enhance usability for beginners and advanced users alike.
  • "The customized deployment process is the most valuable feature in Rancher Labs."
  • "The tool's UI is very convenient enough to help you manage multiple clusters in the cloud or the company, making it a product with which you can manage different clusters and locations."
  • "The product is simple to use for a beginner."

Room for Improvement

Rancher Labs needs to improve stability and integration with its products, streamline usability, and enhance dashboard features like monitoring and security. Users express concerns about unreliable upgrades and security, as well as seeking better application visibility and development support. Additional support for multicloud deployments and improved observability tools are desirable. There's a need for a testing environment and expansion beyond Kubernetes, with considerations for YAML file support and enhanced Harvester development.
  • "While Rancher Labs provides some level of security, it's not considered very robust."
  • "If you have poor infrastructure, you will have issues with the tool."
  • "They should improve application visibility along with code visibility."

ROI

Users reported improved visibility, faster deployment, and enhanced reliability from Rancher Labs. They experienced savings in marketing time and costs, with some estimating a fifty-five percent reduction. Many benefited from the open-source nature without incurring costs, similar to costly alternatives like Red Hat. Feedback was very positive, with many rating it eight out of ten. Numerous users capitalized on the tool's features by leveraging internal team expertise rather than opting for premium support.

Pricing

Rancher Labs offers an open-source solution with no licensing costs, but users may choose to purchase commercial support. Pricing is competitive, sitting mid-range, with fixed monthly fees and possible yearly term licenses. Users report the support fees can be considerable, but generally find costs reasonable due to its open-source nature. Pricing flexibility is suggested to be limited, although it's often compared favorably against similar market solutions. Additional costs may arise for Kubernetes-related services and support.
  • "The cost is reasonable since it's open source. Rancher effectively addresses container orchestration trends, especially for those with some Kubernetes knowledge."
  • "There are no hidden charges attached to the product unless a user opts for the premium support offered by the solution."
  • "The pricing of the solution sits in the mid range, not high and not low. It has a fixed price that you pay every month."

Popular Use Cases

Rancher Labs is primarily utilized for managing, deploying, and orchestrating containers in Kubernetes environments. It is leveraged for deploying containerized applications, monitoring, managing multi-cluster environments, and optimizing resources. Users utilize Rancher Labs across various infrastructures, like on-premises and cloud, to control costs and improve administration. It is widely used for handling Kubernetes licensing, cluster availability, content creation, programming assistance, GitOps functionality, and serving industries ranging from IT to non-tech sectors.

Service and Support

Customer support at Rancher Labs is regarded as excellent, responsive, and helpful, frequently rated around eight out of ten. Users often leverage open-source community forums for assistance, though some rely on direct support only sparingly. Technical support is praised for timely responses and clarity in explanations. Many express satisfaction with the depth and detail of assistance offered. Even those who haven't used direct customer support acknowledge its perceived quality and competence.

Deployment

Rancher Labs's initial setup is largely straightforward, with many finding it easy to deploy and manage. Deployment times range from minutes to a few days, depending on project complexity and company size. Documentation is comprehensive, aiding in the process. Some users required assistance or more advanced setups using RKE, while others appreciated the ease of a single-container deployment. Maintaining the system typically requires minimal effort. Overall, it is considered user-friendly and efficient.

Scalability

Rancher Labs is described as highly scalable, praised by multiple users from various sectors, including Unix, DevOps, administration, and development teams. Users state that scaling is straightforward, requiring just a few commands. Issues with automation scalability are mentioned, yet many emphasize its effectiveness with several users and medium-sized businesses. Users rate scalability highly, indicating satisfaction. Rancher Labs is utilized by numerous users across different teams, with plans for increased usage in the future.

Stability

Rancher Labs stability is generally rated positively with scores ranging from seven to ten. Users find it reliable with good performance, lacking major bugs or crashes. Some mention complexity issues or performance impacts related to specific features like auto-secure, and suggest improvements in the upgrade process. Stability is highly dependent on the underlying infrastructure, with no issues reported when infrastructure is well-managed. Rancher Labs is considered very stable for an open-source platform.
These insights are based on the in-depth reviews provided by peers to help you make a better buying decision.
Download our Rancher Labs Buyer's Guide for additional reliable information.

Review data by company size

By reviewers
By visitors reading reviews

Top industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
25%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Government
7%
Educational Organization
4%
University
4%
Healthcare Company
4%
Comms Service Provider
3%
Retailer
3%
Energy/Utilities Company
3%
Insurance Company
2%
Transportation Company
2%
Non Profit
2%
Construction Company
2%
Legal Firm
2%
Real Estate/Law Firm
2%
Media Company
1%
Hospitality Company
1%
Wholesaler/Distributor
1%
Consumer Goods Company
1%
Aerospace/Defense Firm
1%
Outsourcing Company
1%
Leisure / Travel Company
1%
Engineering Company
1%

Compare Rancher Labs with alternative products

Go!

Learn more about Rancher Labs

Rancher, our flagship container management platform, allows users to easily manage all aspects of running containers in development and production environments, on any infrastructure. With well over four million downloads, Rancher has quickly become the tools of choice for teams serious about running containers in production. This includes large enterprises such as Sony, IBM, Tyco, Align Technologies and more.

Rancher Labs customers

Albert Heijn, Bell, BMC, Samsung, WindStream, Johnson & Johnson

Related questions

  • 2
When evaluating Container Management, what aspect do you think is the most important to look for?
  • 3
Why is Container Management important for companies?

Product Categories

Product Categories
Container Management
Data Storage for Kubernetes

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Rancher Labs reviews

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RyanVassallo - PeerSpot user
Head of Systems and Infrastructure at Booming Games
Verified user of Rancher Labs
Apr 24, 2024
Offers an open-source version along with a good UI

Pros

"The tool's UI is very convenient enough to help you manage multiple clusters in the cloud or the company, making it a product with which you can manage different clusters and locations."

Cons

"If you have poor infrastructure, you will have issues with the tool."

What is our primary use case?

In my company, we use Rancher Labs as an orchestrator for Kubernetes.
We use the tool's in a local on-premises cluster version and not on a managed cloud based one.

I use the solution to manage multiple clusters, which is useful as an orchestrator. My company also uses it for GitOps functionality to have continuous delivery.

What is most valuable?

The product has multiple good features. One of the solution's good features is that it is the GitOps functionality known as Rancher fleet, which is used for continuous delivery. The tool's UI is very convenient enough to help you manage multiple clusters in the cloud or on-premises, making it a product with which you can manage different clusters and locations. The tool also has a feature that is still kind of maturing, but I think it has very good potential.

This new feature is named Harvester, which is allows users to have virtual machines managed by Kubernetes engine. This is very new technology in the market. I think that Harvester needs to mature as a product, and I think that in the future, it will be very powerful. You have one tool that does many things for you.

*Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Read full review (923 words)
Prebin Alex - PeerSpot user
Deputy Manager IT at Veoneer
Verified user of Rancher Labs
Jul 5, 2023
A user-friendly, stable and scalable solution for container orchestration

Pros

"Rancher Labs is a very user-friendly tool."

Cons

"I can't migrate to the newer version."

What is our primary use case?

We are using Rancher Labs for container orchestration.


How has it helped my organization?

We are going through these tools and taking note of the solutions they offer. However, we are still in the process of working on them. Many of our customers have also shown interest in trying these tools, as they are pretty easy. This organization will compare them to other Kubernetes service solution tools. It has a user-friendly UI.

*Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Read full review (528 words)
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Find out what your peers are saying about Rancher Labs. Updated March 2025
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Claudio Kuenzler - PeerSpot user
Senior Systems Engineer at Infiniroot
Verified user of Rancher Labs
May 30, 2023
Product version discussed: 2.x
An easy-to-use user interface, which makes it easy to work with Kubernetes and containers

Pros

"The most valuable feature of Rancher Labs is its user interface, which makes it easier to work with containers and deployment."

Cons

"The biggest room for improvement in Rancher Labs would be to have a proper upgrading plan."

What is our primary use case?

Rancher Labs is used for container infrastructure, managing containers, and the deployment of containers.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature of Rancher Labs is its user interface, which makes it easier to work with containers and deployments. Kubernetes adds additional complexity into an infrastructure. However, with the Rancher Labs user interface, you don't have to go that deep into the control commands to work with Kubernetes. Rancher Labs makes it possible for users without a deep knowledge of Kubernetes to deploy containers and manage Kubernetes.

*Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Read full review (524 words)
Vanny Yang - PeerSpot user
Senior Server Engineer at Cellcard
Verified user of Rancher Labs
Apr 13, 2023
An open-source solution that is stable, popular and easy to deploy

Pros

"The most valuable feature of the solution is that it is an open-source solution that is easy to deploy."

Cons

"There needs to be an improvement in observability and microservice monitoring tools in Rancher Labs."

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature of the solution is that it is an open-source solution that is easy to deploy.

What needs improvement?

Since it is an open-source solution, one can integrate it with any tool. Also, many tools are integrated with it already. There needs to be an improvement in observability and microservice monitoring tools in Rancher Labs.

In the future, I would like to see Rancher Labs focus on increasing its popularity within the open-source community and on developing new tools for the community. It would be great to see more tools released by the large community of Rancher Labs.

*Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Read full review (562 words)
Gogineni Venkatachowdary - PeerSpot user
Cloud Operations Center Analyst at a pharma/biotech company with 10,001+ employees
Verified user of Rancher Labs
Oct 23, 2022
Open-source and easy to set up but does require downtime

Pros

"The initial setup is simple and straightforward. "

Cons

"We'd like their monitoring tool to be integrated by default."

What is our primary use case?

This product is mainly used for monitoring. 

What is most valuable?

We can manage the cluster easily. They have an open-source option so we can manage everything with the Rancher. 

The initial setup is simple and straightforward. 

*Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Read full review (431 words)
MB
Senior Devops Engineer at SDAIA
Verified user of Rancher Labs
May 29, 2024
A solution that enables users to manage multiple Kubernetes clusters, deploy applications, and monitor the health of their clusters and workloads

Pros

"The customized deployment process is the most valuable feature in Rancher Labs. "

Cons

"While Rancher Labs provides some level of security, it's not considered very robust. "

What is our primary use case?

We use Rancher Labs primarily to deploy applications in microservices and Kubernetes environments. Our clients come from various industries, including IT and non-tech sectors.

What is most valuable?

The customized deployment process is the most valuable feature in Rancher Labs.  

*Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Read full review (437 words)
DK
Solution Architect | Head of BizDev at Greg Solutions
Verified user of Rancher Labs
Apr 28, 2022
Product version discussed: 2
Self-contained with a great UI and very good integrations

Pros

"A great UI with very good integrations. "

Cons

"Could be more intuitive."

What is our primary use case?

Rancher has two main versions which are completely different products. They have some similarities because they have a similar UI and similar concept but are different under the hood. The original Rancher was an orchestration platform for Docker containers based on Cattle and we used that solution for three years extensively for different products and on different projects. We're also now using the Rancher 2 on top of the Kubernetes to manage Docker containers for different customers, for projects, to seize logs, to seize mentorings, to downscale or upscale applications. They provide a great catalog of applications that can be created. We recently used Rancher two for another project that was hosted on top of AWS and on-premise servers. It provides and deploys infrastructures, providing UI for the dev team, the management team, QA team, and enables us to see everything that's going on.

How has it helped my organization?

The solution has saved us a lot of time by not requiring us to configure the all details including monitoring, logging, Kubernetes node provisioning on top of public cloud services. 

*Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Read full review (838 words)
Joshua Kurian - PeerSpot user
Sr. Technical Architect at StarOne IT Solutions
Verified user of Rancher Labs
Oct 10, 2023
Suitable for smaller and medium-sized projects

Pros

"The most valuable feature is its comprehensive support, easy resource scaling, compatibility with various OEMs, and seamless service integration. "

Cons

"One area for improvement in Rancher Labs is the development aspect."

What is our primary use case?

I use it for content creation, answering questions, programming help, and more.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature is  its comprehensive support, easy resource scaling, compatibility with various OEMs, and seamless service integration.

*Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Integrator
Read full review (409 words)