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Information Security Engineer at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Easy to deploy, scalable, stable, and has good documentation
Pros and Cons
  • "Scalability is the most valuable feature."
  • "Kubernetes can be used for most companies, but for some companies that may be too small, it may not be worth the investment, as it is expensive."

What is our primary use case?

Kubernetes is a container management platform. 

I use it to be able to sell it to my customers. I am evaluating it and its general features.

I would like to have more knowledge and a good understanding of Kubernetes, what it can do, and what the use cases are to meet the customer's requirements or environment. 

By using it, I can properly advise the clients of what Kubernetes can, and can't do.

What is most valuable?

Scalability is the most valuable feature.

With Kubernetes, you also get High Availability.

What needs improvement?

Kubernetes can be used for most companies, but for some companies that may be too small, it may not be worth the investment, as it is expensive.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been working with Kubernetes for two years.

We are using the latest version.

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What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Kubernetes is a stable product.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Kubernetes is a scalable product.

We have multiple sales teams, some are responsible for large enterprises businesses, some for medium-sized companies.

How are customer service and support?

The documentation they have available is good.

I have not contacted technical support. 

Much like other products such as Red Hat, for example, have their own support.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I work with any product that is related to Kubernetes.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was straightforward. 

It's simple, and it is easy to deploy.

What about the implementation team?

We provide implementation services for our clients as well as maintenance.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

In addition to Kubernetes, you have to pay for support.

The price could be cheaper.

They offer many different licensing models. There are many options to choose from.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend this solution to others. 

It is my job to do this and I feel that it is the future of every company.

We are integrators, and we are working on becoming partners, to obtain the certificate.

I would rate Kubernetes a nine out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Integrator
PeerSpot user
Multi-Cloud Consulting at a construction company with 5,001-10,000 employees
MSP
You can deploy a container pretty quickly compared to a virtual machine
Pros and Cons
    • "One feature I would actually like to see is the network monitoring part. When we talk about communities, it's mostly the computer side. But it does have some enhancements on the networking side which they have recently released. I would like to see more enhancement where we can monitor the networks of the Kubernetes cluster or the Kubernetes workloads."

    What is our primary use case?

    We are not using the Google version, but the open source Kubernetes.

    This product can be deployed both on cloud or on-premises.

    Our use case is mostly for multi-services or the applications which you will try to modernize. Investors will come from monolithic applications to mostly cloud-native applications. When I say cloud-native applications, that means each service component will be part of one container. You need a container orchestration or a management platform. So Kubernetes is actually a management or an orchestration platform for containers. Basically, it works with microservice applications.

    What is most valuable?

    One of Kubernetes' top features is its agility, it is very fast. You can deploy a container pretty quickly compared to a virtual machine. That is one strong feature. A second feature is its flexibility because you can use it on any platform. You can use it on Google or AWS or Microsoft or IBM or any clouds. So flexibility of deployment and agility are the top features. It also helps in your maintenance cycles when you do maintenance on your environment.

    What needs improvement?

    For improvements, I would say it's actually still evolving so they are already making a lot of improvements along the way. Each and every release comes with new features so I think they're doing well.

    One feature I would actually like to see is the network monitoring part. When we talk about communities, it's mostly the computer side. But it does have some enhancements on the networking side which they have recently released. I would like to see more enhancement where we can monitor the networks of the Kubernetes cluster or the Kubernetes workloads.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    This Kubernetes product is new so I would say I have been using it around two years.

    I am using version 1.18, not the latest one.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    Stability is still a question because it depends upon which flavor you're installing. It could be on-prem or it could be cloud, it could be open source. It's still debatable.

    That said, stability-wise I haven't seen any problem myself up to now, but I might not be right. There are many other people who are deploying this in a production environment. I haven't done it myself in production so I would not be the correct person to answer that. But for me, I haven't found any stability issues.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    Kubernetes definitely has good scalability. 

    The number of users on it can vary. It can be used by very small organizations to very large and complex organizations. There is a customer I was working with who has more than 80,000 employees around the globe. But not everyone is a user of this technology. If you're asking about the users of this technology, I would say around 1,000 - 5,000.

    How are customer service and technical support?

    Their technical support depends upon which flavor you're installing. Mostly, if you're going to the cloud version, support is definitely provided by the vendors. Like Microsoft provides its own support, AWS provides their own, and even IBM does the same. But if you're deploying on your own prem, that's where the question is. It depends. It's not a product sold by a single company, it's an open source, so big companies like J.P Morgan or Citibank have it deployed on their own premises and support will be their internal teams who will be working on that.

    How was the initial setup?

    Installation is not a straightforward thing. It's a process that you have to follow step by step. On-prem is a little tedious because you have to spend some time to get this installed and create a platform. But people are mostly inclined towards cloud. They use Kubernetes on the cloud.

    I did install it myself in my lab and the install itself doesn't take much time, about a couple of hours. But to go through the documentation takes time. You have to understand each and every component and then try to install that. So it's a combination of both understanding the documentation and then installing. Because it's a new technology, it does take a little bit of time.

    What about the implementation team?

    It depends. If you talk to a customer and you get a project with them that they want to deploy, you're going to need a project manager or a technical architect, and then you'll need at least one or two guys who can do the hands on deployment. It's not a fairly large team, but you will need a project manager, a technical architect and an engineer.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    There are different types of licenses. You have a subscription-based license if you are talking about cloud. This has both yearly or monthly available. Or you can go on number of workloads, based on how much workload you're putting on the cloud.

    What other advice do I have?

    I would definitely recommend Kubernetes for others who want to start using it.

    I would say it is no longer in its inception phase, but it is still in the early phase. The product hasn't matured enough. There are customers who are looking to take this maybe around two years down the line. On a scale of one to ten, I would give Kubernetes an eight.

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    Hybrid Cloud
    Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
    PeerSpot user
    Buyer's Guide
    Kubernetes
    January 2025
    Learn what your peers think about Kubernetes. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: January 2025.
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    CEO at tamac GmbH
    Real User
    Great scalability, very stable, and a mature product
    Pros and Cons
    • "The most valuable aspect of the solution is the scalability."
    • "The solution can be quite complex for many users."

    What is our primary use case?

    We primarily use the solution for orchestration.

    Most of the clients we work with are enjoying the DevOps aspects of Kubernetes. They want to be able to safely and quickly deploy new applications. Others just enjoy the modern way they can deploy containers without being a DevOp company. 

    What is most valuable?

    The most valuable aspect of the solution is the scalability.

    Kubernetes is quite complex. That's the reason there are some companies that are developing tools simplifying the life of the administrator. There are Kubernetes distributions, like Rancher. Rancher is one of my favorites. There are others too, like OpenShift, for example.

    What needs improvement?

    I would love to see a feature like VMware's vMotion, meaning a workload can be transferred from one host to another without being restarted. While true cloud native applications typically don't need such a feature, there is still a lot of single-container legacy applications out in the field. These applications get unavailable while being rescheduled to another node, for example when doing node maintenance.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I'd been dealing with the solution for the past three or four years.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    The solution if very, very stable. It's a very mature product. While there is no software without bugs, it has 20 or more years of development behind it that makes it very robust.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    The solution is extremely scalable. It's one of its greatest selling points. It also works for businesses of any size, from small to large.

    How are customer service and technical support?

    Technical support is something I handle myself. I don't need to reach out to the Kubernetes team in order to troubleshoot issues.

    We do have manufacturers of specific products that also have their own support we can access if we need to.

    Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

    I have some experience with Docker. I also have a lot of VMware virtualization experience, although that doesn't have much to do with containers, per se.

    That said, almost every software provider tries to adapt their solution to Kubernetes due to the fact that Kubernetes is gaining a lot of attention from everywhere. It's going to be the preferred way to deploy applications.

    How was the initial setup?

    The complexity of the solution depends on the size of the installation and the product you choose. If you choose Kubernetes without any other tools, like Rancher or OpenShift, it's going to be very difficult and complex. However, if you have the chance to use one of those, it's much easier.

    Once the solution is up and running, it requires monitoring, software updates, replacement when something fails, etc. Most of the time it's the provider that manages the infrastructure.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    The solution is open-source. There are no licensing fees to speak of. It's under an Apache license, so anybody can use it. Some products that go on top of it, however, are licensed. 

    What other advice do I have?

    I am a consultant, and I am just providing information about how to use this kind of software within specific companies.

    Kubernetes is evolving now. 1.18 is the latest version, however, we don't have the newest version everywhere. That's the one we choose for new installs when we do them.

    When it's deployed on the cloud, some of my customers are using public clouds such as Amazon, Google, or Microsoft. There are also some customers that use private clouds here in Switzerland. I work together with them.

    If people are using modern technologies like containers or developing software by themselves, I would recommend this solution.

    I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    Hybrid Cloud
    Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Consultant
    PeerSpot user
    reviewer1867368 - PeerSpot reviewer
    Manager-Platform Team / Technical Lead at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees
    Reseller
    Always up-to-date, stable, and offers good community support
    Pros and Cons
    • "There's a lot of community support if you need to get help."
    • "There are features in Google Cloud or AWS that aren't in Azure. They need to implement a couple more tools in Azure."

    What is our primary use case?

    We are using it for hosting applications. Customers are hosted on the Kubernetes Service AKS.

    What is most valuable?

    They've introduced an enterprise option, which is quite helpful. 

    It is always up to date. They're also automatically updating when the new version is ready.

    There's a lot of community support if you need to get help. 

    What needs improvement?

    There are a couple of improvements there also need to be at play.

    For example, if we deploy without RBACs to the cluster, it can't be deployed. When there's like GCPW or AWS, there is room. Even though we have deployed the clusters without RBACs enabled, we can add the RBACs later. However, Microsoft has limitations. There are features in Google Cloud or AWS that aren't in Azure. They need to implement a couple more tools in Azure. 

    The application gateway, app gateway, needs to be improved. It's not fully developed yet.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I've been using the solution for around two years. 

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    The stability is good. It's always up to date and running well. There are no glitches and it doesn't rah or freeze. We did have one bug once however it has since been fixed. It is reliable.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    We have 18 to 20 people using the solution and they are in DevOps. However, I've never tried to scale it. I'm not sure how well it would scale or not. 

    How are customer service and support?

    We have used community help in the past and found it useful. They are helpful and responsive when you need to get a hold of them.

    How would you rate customer service and support?

    Positive

    How was the initial setup?

    The deployment has a moderate level of difficulty. It takes around 30 minutes to 40 minutes to get everything up and running.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    We pay a monthly fee in order to sue the solution. 

    What other advice do I have?

    We're not a partner. We are end-users.

    I'm not sure of the exact version of the solution we are using. 

    Microsoft is hosted on their environment. We can't host it in our own environment. We are using the Azure Kubernetes AKS. If it's Azure, it needs to be hosted on its own Azure Cloud. We can't host it, for example, on-premises. 

    I would advise potential new users to learn about it and try it out.

    I'd rate the solution seven out of ten.

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    Public Cloud

    If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

    Microsoft Azure
    Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: partner/reseller
    PeerSpot user
    reviewer940044 - PeerSpot reviewer
    Senior Manager -Datacenter Planning and Operations at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees
    Real User
    Scalable and stable solution
    Pros and Cons
    • "If you don't have resources, you can certainly add another worker node and expand the cluster."
    • "Setup was not straightforward."

    What is our primary use case?

    My primary use case of this solution is for infrastructure implementations - we allocate an EC2 instance and then define how many worker nodes are needed to run the application and the managed nodes.

    What needs improvement?

    More automation could improve the product - specifically, it would be useful to be able to shut down any IT machines that are currently not in use.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I have been using Kubernetes for around a year and a half.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    I think this solution is stable.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    I think Kubernetes is scalable in a vertical manner, depending on the type of instances in the worker mode. If you don't have resources, you can certainly add another worker node and expand the cluster.

    How are customer service and support?

    With the latest edition of Kubernetes, there is a concern in terms of infrastructure regarding AWS support. There is no specific contact point for issues with Kubernetes, so we have to rely on the internet and blogs in order to work out what has gone wrong. 

    How was the initial setup?

    The setup was not straightforward. There were certain challenges in setting up the product requiring a lot of time on proper configuration and compiling. The first time we deployed took a lot of time but now we can do it in around a week.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    You don't need a license for Kubernetes, but you do have to pay for usage.

    What other advice do I have?

    I would rate Kubernetes as ten out of ten.

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    Private Cloud
    Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
    PeerSpot user
    reviewer1501716 - PeerSpot reviewer
    Executive Vice President at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
    Real User
    The scanning and support network are the best features
    Pros and Cons
    • "The scanning and support network."
    • "The setup and operation of the product should be simplified."

    What is our primary use case?

    Our use case of this product is for mobile banking applications. I'm the executive vice president of the company and we are customers of Kubernetes. 

    What is most valuable?

    The scanning and support network are the best features of this product. 

    What needs improvement?

    I think Kubernetes should simplify the setup and operation of the product. For now, we don't use many of the features that the solution provides, so there's nothing additional I'd like to see. 

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I've been using this solution for over a year. 

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    Most of the time the product is stable but we do encounter some problems from time to time and it can be difficult to file reports. 

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    It's quite easy to scale most of the time but sometimes we encounter some difficulties. 

    How are customer service and technical support?

    We have contacted technical support but sometimes we connect to online support because the official support is not enough. 

    How was the initial setup?

    The initial setup is a bit complex and could be simplified. I think it's a simple setup for developers, but maintenance by the system engineer is quite complex, particularly when it comes to locating the problem. We get some support from the system vendor. Once deployed, maintenance is required on both the application and the infrastructure and our IT team is responsible for that. We have around 50 people involved on the system engineering side, they deal with Kubernetes but also with the operating system and database software. We have around 40 users on a daily basis. 

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    Kubernetes is an open source solution so there is no cost and, for now, no additional costs but we pay for the platform. 

    What other advice do I have?

    I would definitely recommend this product. 

    I rate this solution a nine out of 10. 

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    On-premises
    Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
    PeerSpot user
    BalakrishnanS - PeerSpot reviewer
    Engeener at Dell EMC
    Real User
    Easy to use, stable and scalable
    Pros and Cons
    • "The solution is easy to use."
    • "The support could be faster at resolving issues."

    What is our primary use case?

    We use Kubernetes as a container management solution. We use the Kubernetes solution for security analysis on Verizon's client systems.

    Kubernetes container services can be used for deploying applications and they can be deployed on the path layer. You deploy Kubernetes, and inside it, you deploy VMs and application containers. If you take Cloud Foundry inside the data cells, you deploy the application and data. This is how the solution operates.

    What is most valuable?

    The solution is easy to use.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I have been using Kubernetes for approximately two years.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    The solution is stable.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    Kubernetes is scalable.

    How are customer service and support?

    The support could be faster at resolving issues.

    What about the implementation team?

    We have approximately 12 workers that do the implementation.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    The solution requires a license to use it.

    What other advice do I have?

    I would recommend this Kubernetes to others, it is a good technology.

    I rate Kubernetes an eight out of ten.

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    Public Cloud

    If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

    Amazon Web Services (AWS)
    Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
    PeerSpot user
    Solution Architect at KIAN company
    Real User
    Is stable and scalable, and can be used to provide distribution systems for storage
    Pros and Cons
    • "Kubernetes offers a lot of great features such as scalability and great portability of applications."
    • "I think that the GUI dashboard in Kubernetes is very simple and that there are no great options."

    What is our primary use case?

    We use Kubernetes to provide distribution systems for storage and for the control plane manager.

    What is most valuable?

    Kubernetes offers a lot of great features such as scalability and great portability of applications.

    What needs improvement?

    I think that the GUI dashboard in Kubernetes is very simple and that there are no great options. Also, it is a very simple HTML GUI. So the Kubernetes community should provide a central and better GUI for managing pods and containers.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I've been working with Kubernetes for around two years.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    Kubernetes is very stable.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    It is very scalable. If you become a master in Kubernetes, you can provide great configurations to be scalable.

    How was the initial setup?

    I have to install Kubernetes clusters based on the machines. I spent around one hour to install a Kubernetes cluster with three servers for the master node and around 50 servers for worker nodes.

    What about the implementation team?

    I implemented it myself.

    What other advice do I have?

    I would recommend Kubernetes, especially, to development teams and DevOps engineers. 

    On a scale from one to ten, I would rate it at ten.

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    On-premises
    Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
    PeerSpot user
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