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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service

    Score8 out of 10
    Mid-Size Companies (51-1,000 employees)
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service is a managed Kubernetes offering, delivering user tools and built-in security for rapid delivery of applications that users can bind to cloud services related to IBM Watson®, IoT, DevOps and data analytics. As a certified K8s provider, IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service provides intelligent scheduling, self-healing, horizontal scaling, service discovery and load balancing, automated rollouts and rollbacks, and secret and configuration management. The Kubernetes…N/A

    Kubernetes

    Score9.1 out of 10
    N/AKubernetes is an open-source container cluster manager.N/A
    Pricing
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes ServiceKubernetes
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes ServiceKubernetes
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    YesNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
    Additional Details
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes ServiceKubernetes
    Considered Both Products
    IBM
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    I have earlier used various services, such as Kubernetes and Google Cloud Run. Still, IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service offers more convenience and a larger set of functions and features are available in Kubernetes. Google Cloud Run is much closer to a server less approach to …
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    Both services are very similar and work in a very similar way, both fulfilling their purpose well. IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service was chosen to test how a different platform from the traditional one would work during the execution of the project and whether it would perform well. …
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    Many solutions and vendors are offering the service to deploy a solution for based Kubernetes cloud, but we have selected IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service for the optimization, high availability, DRP process, reduced downtimes, support, documentation, and the easy way to deploy Kube…
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    IBM Kubernetes Service and Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) are two popular managed Kubernetes offerings that allow organizations to deploy, manage and scale their containerized applications.

    Advantages of IBM Kubernetes Service
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service is a scalable solution, but compared to AWS and Mirantis it is not auto-scaling, and The technical support from IBM is kind of poor.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    With the scalability, the management, the coordination, IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service really empowers the whole IT team and gives the company more time back than we had before. It is a system that has the capability to manage where workloads are being distributed out and [do] …
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    Kubernetes was original formed by Google. We had a lot of compute in Google Cloud Platform and used to use their managed Kubernetes service Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) and it performed quite well. I think both products are solid, but I lean toward GKE. However, I would opt …
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    I used also Kubernetes on-premise installation. It permits you to install a custom Kubernetes cluster in your physical machines. The advantages are clearly the complete access to the machines via ssh and the possibility of customization. In the cons, the costs are really high …
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    OpenShift is AMAZING and the integration with IBM cloud is unique. OpenShift is more powerful than IBM Kubernetes for production workloads.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    I only started using it because of the always free tier and you probably should consider enhancing the always free tier of Kubernetes (such as enabling load balancer or increasing worker node specs) to attract customers just to land on IBM cloud as their intention to play/learn …
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    We did not select IBM Cloud Kubernetes over the others. Our objectives are to support each cloud vendor and be professional with our expertise and advice. IBM Cloud is a major enterprise vendor that we must support for our business.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    The GUI is better. The platform is designed to create a good user experience and easily deploy simple applications. You do not need prior knowledge of Kubernetes!
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    Due to the features of IBM Cloud we get benefits of deploying Docker containers using the Kubernetes Cluster.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    We are already using Bluemix for other deployments, so it was easy to incorporate Cloud Kubernetes service into our app. Cloud Foundry does not have the CPU options that we needed.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    We already used other products of IBM Cloud, so we did some research to compare Kubernetes providers. We came to the conclusion that the IBM Kubernetes service is the best after the Google Kubernetes Engine.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    This is a very difficult question, because there are a lot of similarities and the differences are minor but could be important if your use-case requires something like that.
    For example if you need a cluster that is ready sooner than 45 minutes or a data center/location in …
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    IBM Cloud is simple to use and has no custom requirements to start, Other products are not cost-efficient compared to IBM IKS.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    Well, as we were in a state to compulsory implement this service, but then it is very suited for deployment of a service that has higher fault tolerance. And maintaining the lifecycle of custom made resources. And the ability to integrate other services also
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    It's very fast, easy to navigate, and has more features and compatibility while using the GUI. Pricing is less compared to IBM.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    I say IKS still has a more to work, while it benefits in being an early adopter like GKE, most of these services are easier to work on when it comes to web management, something the IKS lacks and needs to improve since its release because of how well-established the management …
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    IBM works well with handling large scale legacy applications. In view of the same, I trust IBM innovation and knowledge around handling enterprise applications well.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    They are cumbersome.
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    It's User friendly and simple to create CI CD jobs
    Incentivized
    Chose IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    IBM Cloud has a lot of benefits for deploying containerized applications and compared with other cloud products IBM is cheaper.
    Incentivized
    Kubernetes
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    96%
    Would buy again
    27 Answers
    100%
    Would buy again
    9 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    25 Answers
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    9 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    28 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    9 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    19 Answers
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    5 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    26 Answers
    75%
    Implementation went as expected
    6 Answers
    Features
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes ServiceKubernetes
    Container Management
    Comparison of Container Management features of IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service and Kubernetes
    Feature
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service
    8.1
    20 Ratings
    1% below category average
    Kubernetes
    9.2
    4 Ratings
    12% above category average
    Security and Isolation8.120 Ratings9.34 Ratings
    Container Orchestration8.520 Ratings9.84 Ratings
    Cluster Management7.820 Ratings9.84 Ratings
    Storage Management8.020 Ratings8.64 Ratings
    Resource Allocation and Optimization8.020 Ratings8.84 Ratings
    Discovery Tools7.819 Ratings9.34 Ratings
    Update Rollouts and Rollbacks7.720 Ratings9.34 Ratings
    Self-Healing and Recovery8.418 Ratings9.33 Ratings
    Analytics, Monitoring, and Logging8.220 Ratings9.04 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes ServiceKubernetes
    Small Businesses
    Mirantis Kubernetes Engine
    Score8 out of 10
    Mirantis Kubernetes Engine
    Score8 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS)
    Score8.6 out of 10
    Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS)
    Score8.6 out of 10
    Enterprises
    SUSE Rancher
    Score9.4 out of 10
    SUSE Rancher
    Score9.4 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes ServiceKubernetes
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.0
    (86 ratings)
    8.7
    (19 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    8.9
    (16 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    Usability
    8.7
    (16 ratings)
    9.0
    (3 ratings)
    Availability
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Performance
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    7.7
    (4 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Online Training
    8.7
    (15 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    7.6
    (3 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    1.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes ServiceKubernetes
    Likelihood to Recommend
    IBM
    IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service also stands out in environments where the workloads vary continuously and require befitting scale. The product excels particularly in microservices structures, wherein the companies would harness the capacity for container orchestration and automated scaling. Still, it may face the challenges due to monolith applications that have not been originally developed for using container technology.
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    K8s should be avoided - If your application works well without being converted into microservices-based architecture & fits correctly in a VM, needs less scaling, have a fixed traffic pattern then it is better to keep away from Kubernetes. Otherwise, the operational challenges & technical expertise will add a lot to the OPEX. Also, if you're the one who thinks that containers consume fewer resources as compared to VMs then this is not true. As soon as you convert your application to a microservice-based architecture, a lot of components will add up, shooting your resource consumption even higher than VMs so, please beware. Kubernetes is a good choice - When the application needs quick scaling, is already in microservice-based architecture, has no fixed traffic pattern, most of the employees already have desired skills.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    IBM
    • IBM has a strong focus on serverless and Kubernetes. This shows in the platform. Deploying containers to Kubernetes was very easy.
    • Deploying a Kubernetes cluster through the GUI is very easy and quick. On top of that, IBM Cloud offers a single node cluster for Free.
    • Container Registry is a very good product for managing container images. Integration with Kubernetes was seemless.
    • Portability. To transition from Google Cloud Kubernetes to IBM Cloud Kubernetes took almost no effort. We mostly use the CLI and the standard tools such as kubectl were present.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    • Complex cluster management can be done with simple commands with strong authentication and authorization schemes
    • Exhaustive documentation and open community smoothens the learning process
    • As a user a few concepts like pod, deployment and service are sufficient to go a long way
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    IBM
    • I constantly get this error even when everything is well configured prefect.exceptions.AuthorizationError: [{'path': ['auth_info'], 'message': 'AuthenticationError: Forbidden', 'extensions': {'code': 'UNAUTHENTICATED'}}]
    • Then sometimes the error disapear without changine anything, happened twice to me. Should there be an issue with the authentication service? Please let's improve or let users know why this may be happening.
    • Improve the UX in the browse console when removing many images at once
    • UX on the process of installing KeyCloack operator
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    • Local development, Kubernetes does tend to be a bit complicated and unnecessary in environments where all development is done locally.
    • The need for add-ons, Helm is almost required when running Kubernetes. This brings a whole new tool to manage and learn before a developer can really start to use Kubernetes effectively.
    • Finicy configmap schemes. Kubernetes configmaps often have environment breaking hangups. The fail safes surrounding configmaps are sadly lacking.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    IBM
    We have our application running on a CentOS compartment on IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service. We have been utilizing the help since IBM Cloud initially dispatched. We liked the adaptability and versatility that IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service give us. Since we are tiny, the Kubernetes administration is just utilized at present inside my venture bunch.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    The Kubernetes is going to be highly likely renewed as the technologies that will be placed on top of it are long term as of planning. There shouldn't be any last minute changes in the adoption and I do not anticipate sudden change of the core underlying technology. It is just that the slow process of technology adoption that makes it hard to switch to something else.
    Read full review
    Usability
    IBM
    We actually haven't had any real problems in our clusters recently and the results we have gotten from adopting IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service have been beyond even our greatest expectations. The community has helped optimize the use of the system and make it relatively simpler to use.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    It is an eminently usable platform. However, its popularity is overshadowed by its complexity. To properly leverage the capabilities and possibilities of Kubernetes as a platform, you need to have excellent understanding of your use case, even better understanding of whether you even need Kubernetes, and if yes - be ready to invest in good engineering support for the platform itself
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    IBM
    IBM's cloud is almost infallible.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    No answers on this topic
    Performance
    IBM
    IBM's cloud has a site in my conuntry (MEXICO) so the network latency was almost 0
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    IBM
    The self-guided support was solid, and there are plenty of online videos to guide first time users, but I think one area of improvement is a faster way to transfer a large quantity of files from our local machine to the cloud for storage (Aspera)
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    No answers on this topic
    Online Training
    IBM
    Online training is really an important resource for using these tools. IBM's help center is rich in useful information and tips. Also, external guides and tutorials are available (e.g. on youtube), but I followed only IBM ones and I had no difficulties.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation Rating
    IBM
    Ease of use. Very intuitive. We have been looking for a product that allows us to orchestrate our docker containers in a way where it allows us to effectively scale our applications to production. It also provides us a way of monitoring all our infrastructure in a very clear concise way.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    IBM
    We mainly selected [IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service] because IBM fabric blockchain service is mostly compatible with it. To have all the infrastructure in a single cloud to get the best output we selected the [IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service].
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    Most of the required features for any orchestration tool or framework, which is provided by Kubernetes. After understanding all modules and features of the K8S, it is the best fit for us as compared with others out there.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Scalability
    IBM
    IBM's CKS does not offers automatic autoscaling nor vertical scaling (automatic). Other services like Google Kubernetes Engine scales up and down very well
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    No answers on this topic
    Return on Investment
    IBM
    • Increased development speed and agility allows to build features faster and more economically.
    • Improved resource utilization helps keep applications running very efficiently, which saves on cloud service expenses.
    • Scalability and resilience allows for scaling up or down based on demand, which keeps applications running efficiently and more economically.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Kubernetes
    • Because of microservices, Kubernetes makes it easy to find the cost of each application easily.
    • Like every new technology, initially, it took more resources to educate ourselves but over a period of time, I believe it's going to be worth it.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
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