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Kubernetes vs VMware Tanzu Platform comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 9, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Kubernetes
Ranking in Container Management
4th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
78
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VMware Tanzu Platform
Ranking in Container Management
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
Build Automation (13th), PaaS Clouds (12th), Cloud Management (25th), Development Platforms (3rd), Service Mesh (7th), Agile and DevOps Services (2nd)
 

Featured Reviews

Venu Boddu - PeerSpot reviewer
Manage infrastructure automation and smooth application deployment with robust auto-scaling capabilities
Kubernetes is highly valuable for its node-based setup, which allows for the running of multiple pods. This feature is essential for infrastructure automation and application deployment. Kubernetes also offers rollback control and auto-scaling capabilities, which are crucial for maintaining an application's availability even if nodes or pods go down. Additionally, Kubernetes supports load balancing to distribute traffic efficiently across multiple pods.
DarshanChaudhari - PeerSpot reviewer
Empowers seamless connectivity and integration through APIs while offering robust auto-scaling
I am involved in IT services and we provide a solution to customers. We work with VMware, Nutanix, OpenShift, and Microsoft Hyper-V The Tanzu platform is highly available, scalable, and flexible. It offers native services for autoscaling and integrations through APIs, allowing seamless…

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Auto-scaling and self-healing features are very good."
"The product is highly scalable."
"I like that it gives you all the flexibility, for example, auto-scaling. Everything is figured out exactly right. It manages all your workloads without much intervention. It can scale in, scale out, and with security. Everything looks pretty good compared to the old legacy way of working."
"The autoscaling feature is the most valuable. Kubernetes itself is an orchestration tool. It automatically detects the load, and it automatically spins up the new Pod in the form of a new microservice deployment."
"Kubernetes is a leading container orchestration solution, known for its simplicity and ease of use. Being open-source, it benefits from large community support, including enterprise support. Many companies offer their own version of Kubernetes, making it widely adopted and supported in the industry."
"The most valuable feature of Kubernetes is the integration with other solutions, such as Formative and Grafana."
"The most valuable feature is that it's a container orchestrator. It has a huge user base and it is easily incorporated into all of the public clouds."
"Once you get it configured properly, it's a stable solution."
"Tanzu Mission Control has quite a set of rich features when compared to OpenShift."
"The most valuable feature of VMware Tanzu Mission Control is the management functionality of the cluster life cycle. Additionally, the solution integrates well with other vendors, such as Velero for backups and Sonobuoy for compliance. Additionally, it works well in multi-cluster environments."
"The valuable feature I have found to be the management of Kubernetes clusters in a private cloud or public clouds, such as Azure or Google Cloud Platform."
"Defining security metrics has proven beneficial for customers in maintaining a safe environment."
"There are a lot of services available in VMware Tanzu Application Service, such as databases and application servers. You have everything you need in one application and you do not need to search outside of the solution."
"Tanzu is easy to upgrade and scale, whether we're talking about horizontal or vertical scaling. It is as smooth as possible without any downtime. The platform maintenance, upgrading, and operations part is very smooth."
"The Tanzu platform is highly available, scalable, and flexible."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is the ability to check the flow of all the different variants within our applications."
 

Cons

"Security could be improved. It would be helpful if there were other security modules built into Kubernetes."
"Kubernetes is a complex solution. The product needs to be more manageable and user-friendly."
"The solution has some issues regarding availability during high loads. Worker nodes are sometimes unavailable, affecting the overall availability of the applications. This is a bug or underlying problem with the tool, and Azure and other providers are looking into improving this by releasing new versions of Kubernetes that fix some of the platform's issues."
"We would like to see more validation tools added to this solution, this would provide pre-deployment analysis that developers could use before publishing their infrastructure."
"The platform could be more convenient to use."
"The dashboard, monitoring, and login need improvements."
"Lacks some scalability and more user-friendly operability."
"It would be very interesting if they could introduce a template engine to set dynamic values in the deployment time. It would be ideal if it could be native in Kubernetes as it would be much easier."
"Tanzu could provide more granular control over whatever networking is being done on the containers. I would also like to see a slightly more detailed view of application-level tracing. I'm referring to the connections between different microservices. If they added a service-matching feature, that would be helpful for the customers to build or be more effective."
"The implementation is not easy, it is very complex and can take a day or two to complete."
"We want to see a new feature that helps build more security architecture like Zero Trust Security or shifting left in Kubernetes."
"I would like to see additional support for things outside of Cloud Foundry."
"Customers have noticed a considerable price increase after VMware's acquisition by Broadcom."
"The solution is currently focused on VMware infrastructure and I would like to see more options made available."
"This product doesn't have a GUI. In order to use it properly, I need to connect it to a new GUI or build a GUI to manage it — it's pretty difficult."
"VMware Tanzu Service Mesh could add better integration with other cloud platforms, such as vRealize Automation or VMware vCloud Director for cloud providers."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"This is an open-source solution, so there are no licensing costs associated with its use."
"I am using the solution's open-source version."
"Kubernetes is open-source."
"Kubernetes is free; it's open-source software."
"Google Kubernetes Engine is free in the simplest setup, AWS Kubernetes Engine costs about $50 (depending on the region), in a three master setup, so it's almost the same as the cost of the EC2 instances and it's totally fine from my point of view."
"The price of Kubernetes could be lower. However, it is less expensive than VMware Tanzu. Additionally, technical support is expensive. The overall cost of the solution is approximately $1,000 annually."
"Kubernetes is an open-source solution that can be free. We have some distribution with licenses, such OpenShift and Tucows in Amazon. They are billing services."
"I would say the solution is worth the money, but it depends on the required workloads, the type of workload, and the scaling requirements etc."
"Its pricing is very competitive. We get around 70% or 75%, sometimes even 80%, discount on the product. I would rate it a four out of five in terms of pricing."
"The product is not expensive, but it is not cheap."
"The licensing cost is expensive."
"One of our Spanish customers told us that VMware Tanzu Service Mesh is a very expensive product for their data center."
"Since we were at a large data center, the price might not have been a concern for us."
"The price of VMware Tanzu Mission Control is greater than that of Red Hat's competitor solution"
"The least expensive licensing cost for VMware is around $350 per core."
"There are different licenses available. You have to upgrade your license if you want to scale the solution more."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Kubernetes?
There are many good features. I feel that the scale-out features, like replica sets, are very good. The number of running containers can be autoscaled.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Kubernetes?
Since we use Kubernetes on-premises, the costs are related to our expertise and the personnel we hire.
What needs improvement with Kubernetes?
Although we face issues when migrating to new versions of Kubernetes, such as misunderstandings on using new features or integration with proxy services, these issues can be addressed with proper p...
Which is better - OpenShift Container Platform or VMware Tanzu Mission Control?
Red Hat Openshift is ideal for organizations using microservices and cloud environments. I like that the platform is auto-scalable, which saves overhead time for developers. I think Openshift can b...
What do you like most about VMware Tanzu Application Service?
The solution is integrated very well with a lot of other systems. Also, its GUI is very good.
What is your primary use case for VMware Tanzu Application Service?
Since I have a developer team, they use the solution for testing purposes.
 

Also Known As

K8
Tanzu Application Catalog, Application Platform, Application Service, Hub, Mission Control, Service Mesh, Build Service, Concourse for VMware Tanzu
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

China unicom, NetEase Cloud, Nav, AppDirect
Verizon, Cerner, Zipcar, Avarteq
Find out what your peers are saying about Kubernetes vs. VMware Tanzu Platform and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
842,767 professionals have used our research since 2012.