Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) vs. DigitalOcean Kubernetes

AKS works very well for running containerized applications that require high availability and scalability. This includes systems like our HRIS platform and customer-facing web applications. AKS is a good choice when applications are broken into multiple services that need independent scaling and deployment. It provides the flexibility needed to manage these architectures effectively. But for single, low-traffic applications or simple internal tools, AKS can be overkill. For scenarios like that Azure App Service would be better.

Incentivized

DO Kubernetes is well-suited for: - deploying APIs - deploying workers - log collection and analysis (ie ELK stack) - deploying Helm charts and anything that can be mapped on to K8s concepts Less appropriate for anything requiring no public Internet access (ie VPC only). Less appropriate for anything requiring integration with the DO app platform via VPC, at the moment.

Incentivized

• AKS makes it easier to replicate data to multiple regions
• Azure portal make it easier to manage the resources of the organization

Incentivized

• Hosted dashboard
• Hosted container registry
• Horizontal auto-scaling
• LetsEncrypt SSL termination

Incentivized

• Steep learning curve
• Expected charges are unclear until you see real production usage
• Operations teams need to learn an entirely new skill set

Incentivized

• Option for internal VPC-only deployment
• Better integration with cloud firewall
• Better integration with DO App platform via VPC

Incentivized

As already said, the UI/CLI and even terraform are perfectly fine, but certain details could be documented better. For instance, if I want to secure the whole Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) with my own managed keys, then it is very complex and hard to get there. Not really a single source that gives you the whole picture. Besides that, it is still good to use, in most cases intuitive but details mentioned as above can be tricky.

Incentivized

Microsoft support was really good, whenever we raise any ticket they come back to us within a couple of hours.

Incentivized

Amazon EKS stacked up very well and had better performance in some areas. However, Azure Kubernetes Service was a better fit given our Azure environment.

Incentivized

DigitalOcean is the most affordable and straightforward of the hosted Kubernetes options we evaluated. All features that we require are supported without an excess of complication of extraneous features. Straightforward billing is also very important for us in comparison to the Big Three cloud hosts, which have very complicated billing practices. DigitalOcean also provides a platform with very little vendor lock-in.

Incentivized

• We had to spend more time on Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) than on AWS and GCP to get our kubernetes cluster up and running
• The resources on nodes need to be left out unused, so effectively it is wasting money there
• It definitely made us spend more time into maintaining kubernetes

Incentivized

• Excellent uptime
• Low cost for provided value
• Good integration with the rest of the DO platform to provide additional value

Incentivized