Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) vs. Portainer

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)
Score 7.9 out of 10
N/A
Microsoft's Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) is designed to make deploying and managing containerized applications easy. It offers serverless Kubernetes, an integrated continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) experience, and enterprise-grade security and governance. It allows development and operations teams on a single platform to rapidly build, deliver, and scale applications with confidence.N/A
Portainer
Score 9.6 out of 10
N/A
Portainer is a centralized container management platform for containerized apps and IoT device management. It helps accelerate container adoption and reduce time-to-value on Kubernetes, Docker, and Swarm with a management portal, allowing users to deliver and manage containerized applications from the data center to the edge. Portainer helps - Reduce the operational complexity associated with multi-cluster management Bridge the skills gap and facilitate feature…
$0
Pricing
Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)Portainer
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Portainer Business - 3 Nodes Free
$0
Home & Student
$149
per year
Starter
$995
per year
Professional
$2995
per year
Enterprise
Contact Sales for Pricing
per year
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)Portainer
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeOptional
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)Portainer
Features
Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)Portainer
Container Management
Comparison of Container Management features of Product A and Product B
Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)
5.6
Ratings
32% below category average
Portainer
8.5
Ratings
9% above category average
Security and Isolation8.00 Ratings8.70 Ratings
Container Orchestration8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Cluster Management2.00 Ratings8.70 Ratings
Storage Management3.00 Ratings8.60 Ratings
Resource Allocation and Optimization9.00 Ratings7.80 Ratings
Discovery Tools4.00 Ratings8.90 Ratings
Update Rollouts and Rollbacks1.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Self-Healing and Recovery7.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Analytics, Monitoring, and Logging8.00 Ratings8.10 Ratings
User Ratings
Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)Portainer
Likelihood to Recommend
7.0
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Usability
7.0
(0 ratings)
8.4
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
9.0
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)Portainer
Likelihood to Recommend
[Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)] is great when you need to be able to deploy a large number of services in a highly repeatable way. Once you know how to use it, it is a very fast to stand up a new environment. However there is a lot you need to know to get to that point and it is a specialized area. This is not suitable for small teams who are supporting multiple product stacks.
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Many developers, especially lesser experienced developers, don't have a really good background in setting up containers from the command line. Portainer is invaluable to them. Giving a UI to them gives them much more confidence and allows them to learn properties and capabilities of containers under far less stress. On the flip side of this, giving then a UI on a production system can lead to chaos...never give junior developers access to production servers.
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Pros
  • To scale the microservices very easily.
  • Easy to set up in CI/CD pipeline.
  • It has a good pricing option as well in Azure. Basic works fine.
  • Accelerates containerized application development for the developers.
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  • Separating server maintenance with application development, providing a clear user interface for developers who don't want to worry about the underlying server.
  • RBAC for container deployment linked to a SAML IDP, not something particularly easy in a native Docker instance but point and shoot in Portainer, allowing the use of Azure / Okta etc to provide user access.
  • Image management with multiple repositories is super clear and reduces incidents
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Cons
  • GUI on azure portal need to enhanced.
  • The feature set should be matching with Openshift which is also kubernetes based
  • Troubleshooting errors
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  • Lack of granular RBAC control: While Portainer does have role-based access control (RBAC) features, they are not as granular as some users would like. Some users have reported that they would like to have more control over permissions for individual users or groups. This would enable more fine-grained control over who has access to which containers or clusters.
  • Limited support for non-Docker container technologies: While Portainer is primarily designed to manage Docker containers, it does have some limited support for other container technologies like Kubernetes and Docker Swarm. However, this support is not as robust as it is for Docker, and some users have reported that they would like to see better support for other container technologies.
  • Limited control over container networking: Portainer's networking features are somewhat limited compared to other container management tools. Some users have reported that they would like more control over container networking, including the ability to create custom networks and control IP addresses.
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Likelihood to Renew
No answers on this topic
It is an excellent tool.
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Usability
Barring certain missing features such as operator management , open cluster management, it does gives lot of options to host containerized applications. The GUI may be improved and can give user more insights to the cluster rather than using command line tools. The integration with standard azure monitoring tools is a big plus to use Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)
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Accessibility for Non-Experts: even with some people having a bit longer on-boarding it is still very simple Quick setup is insanely useful, we can get it running in 10 seconds after installing docker Portainer has once again super clean UI and is very user friendly. Deployment/monitoring and management are super easy. I can tell just from a glance if something is out of date (watching at you Watchtower not doing your job for some reason)
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Support Rating
Microsoft support was really good, whenever we raise any ticket they come back to us within a couple of hours.
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One of their staff members jumped on a video call immediately with me and led me through the problem and solution during a quick session of screen sharing. In this day and age that is above and beyond, especially when it comes to software. It took approximately 5-10 minutes to diagnose and fix, including pleasantries!
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Implementation Rating
No answers on this topic
It is really easy. Just follow the documentation.
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Alternatives Considered
Worked with very similar in-house-built Kubernetes/container management system. We are leveraging AKS as it's more robust and stable being in the technical space for quite some time. Also, it has got a vast number of management and security features which makes it more attractive. They even have a model where the cost can be reduced by up to 90% if the application can afford to handle a quick downtime once in a while.
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Portainer takes the cup in terms of usability and features. It is also more useful for smaller deployments, whereas Kubernetes in our opinion and experience, could probably be more suited to certain other use cases. Portainer is also a fresh feel among all the preexisting container management solutions and brings positivity and a new breeze in the industry.
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Return on Investment
  • The ability to scale has reduced the need for headcount in IT
  • The authentication process has kept us compliant with regulatory bodies
  • The ability to replicate environments is great.
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  • Instead of having 1 senior who does all the setup, debugging and caretaking of "all things docker" we now split the load on basically everyone in the team. Hard to put into direct numbers but with everyone helping themselves, noone alone is forced into that position "because you know how to do it" and overall we're more productive
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ScreenShots

Portainer Screenshots

Screenshot of Portainer is a universal container management platform to help adopt and manage Docker, Kubernetes, Nomad and Edge environments.