Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

AWS Lambda VS LXD

Compare AWS Lambda VS LXD and see what are their differences

AWS Lambda logo AWS Lambda

Automatic, event-driven compute service

LXD logo LXD

Daemon based on liblxc offering a REST API to manage containers
  • AWS Lambda Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-04-29
  • LXD Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-28

AWS Lambda features and specs

  • Scalability
    AWS Lambda automatically scales your application by running your code in response to each trigger. This means no manual intervention is required to handle varying levels of traffic.
  • Cost-effectiveness
    You only pay for the compute time you consume. Billing is metered in increments of 100 milliseconds and you are not charged when your code is not running.
  • Reduced Operations Overhead
    AWS Lambda abstracts the infrastructure management layer, so there is no need to manage or provision servers. This allows you to focus more on writing code for your applications.
  • Flexibility
    Supports multiple programming languages such as Python, Node.js, Ruby, Java, Go, and .NET, which allows you to use the language you are most comfortable with.
  • Integration with Other AWS Services
    Seamlessly integrates with many other AWS services such as S3, DynamoDB, RDS, SNS, and more, making it versatile and highly functional.
  • Automatic Scaling and Load Balancing
    Handles thousands of concurrent requests without managing the scaling yourself, making it suitable for applications requiring high availability and reliability.

Possible disadvantages of AWS Lambda

  • Cold Start Latency
    The first request to a Lambda function after it has been idle for a certain period can take longer to execute. This is referred to as a 'cold start' and can impact performance.
  • Resource Limits
    Lambda has defined limits, such as a maximum execution timeout of 15 minutes, memory allocation ranging from 128 MB to 10,240 MB, and temporary storage up to 512 MB.
  • Vendor Lock-in
    Using AWS Lambda ties you into the AWS ecosystem, making it difficult to migrate to another cloud provider or an on-premises solution without significant modifications to your application.
  • Complexity of Debugging
    Debugging and monitoring distributed, serverless applications can be more complex compared to traditional applications due to the lack of direct access to the underlying infrastructure.
  • Cold Start Issues with VPC
    When Lambda functions are configured to access resources within a Virtual Private Cloud (VPC), the cold start latency can be exacerbated due to additional VPC networking overhead.
  • Limited Execution Control
    AWS Lambda is designed for stateless, short-running tasks and may not be suitable for long-running processes or tasks requiring complex orchestration.

LXD features and specs

  • Lightweight
    LXD containers are lightweight compared to virtual machines as they share the host's kernel, resulting in lower overhead and faster startup times.
  • Security
    LXD offers strong security with unprivileged containers, AppArmor, Seccomp, and other isolation features, reducing the risk of container breakout.
  • Scalability
    LXD is highly scalable, allowing for the orchestration and management of thousands of containers across multiple nodes seamlessly.
  • Comprehensive API
    LXD provides a simple and powerful REST API to manage containers, making it easily integratable with various automation and orchestration tools.
  • Integration with Native Tools
    LXD allows the use of native system management tools and scripts within containers, providing a level of familiarity and ease of use for administrators.
  • Snapshots and Clones
    LXD supports fast snapshot and cloning operations, which makes it easy to back up and duplicate container states efficiently.

Possible disadvantages of LXD

  • Linux-Specific
    LXD is designed specifically for Linux environments and doesn't provide native support for running non-Linux applications.
  • Learning Curve
    New users might find the initial learning and configuration process challenging, especially if they are not familiar with Linux container technologies.
  • Less Mature Ecosystem
    Compared to Docker, the LXD ecosystem is less mature, which might result in fewer third-party tools, resources, and community support.
  • Resource Limitation
    Although LXD provides resource limitations, fine-grained control and resource management might not be as robust compared to some other container solutions.
  • Network Configuration
    Network configuration in LXD can be complex, especially for advanced networking scenarios, requiring a good understanding of network namespaces and bridges.

AWS Lambda videos

AWS Lambda Vs EC2 | Serverless Vs EC2 | EC2 Alternatives

More videos:

  • Tutorial - AWS Lambda Tutorial | AWS Tutorial for Beginners | Intro to AWS Lambda | AWS Training | Edureka
  • Tutorial - AWS Lambda | What is AWS Lambda | AWS Lambda Tutorial for Beginners | Intellipaat

LXD videos

Review Virtual Machines in LXD 3.20

More videos:

  • Review - Mahindra Jeeto Mini Van LXD 2019 | detailed review | price | features
  • Review - Mahindra Jeeto Minivan I Walkaround Review - 2019 Mahindra Jeeto Minivan LXD

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to AWS Lambda and LXD)
Cloud Computing
93 93%
7% 7
Cloud Hosting
95 95%
5% 5
OS & Utilities
0 0%
100% 100
Developer Tools
87 87%
13% 13

User comments

Share your experience with using AWS Lambda and LXD. For example, how are they different and which one is better?
Log in or Post with

Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare AWS Lambda and LXD

AWS Lambda Reviews

Top 7 Firebase Alternatives for App Development in 2024
AWS Lambda is suitable for applications with varying workloads and those already using the AWS ecosystem.
Source: signoz.io

LXD Reviews

We have no reviews of LXD yet.
Be the first one to post

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, AWS Lambda seems to be a lot more popular than LXD. While we know about 275 links to AWS Lambda, we've tracked only 9 mentions of LXD. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

AWS Lambda mentions (275)

View more

LXD mentions (9)

  • Canonical re-licenses LXD under AGPLv3, slaps a CLA on top
    Linux containers project. Foreshadowing of this move at https://linuxcontainers.org/lxd/. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • LXD is now under Canonical
    The expected changes are: - https://github.com/lxc/lxd will now become https://github.com/canonical/lxd - https://linuxcontainers.org/lxd will disappear and be replaced with a mention directing users to https://ubuntu.com/lxd - The LXD YouTube channel will be handed over to the Canonical team - The LXD section on the LinuxContainers community forum will slowly Be sunset in favor of the Ubuntu Discourse forum... Source: almost 2 years ago
  • LXC images download
    Hello community, It seems LXC images for arm7l/armhf are no longer available, not from the official Turris mirror nor from LinuxContainers.org (https://linuxcontainers.org/lxd/). Any solution or alternative for people like me heavily relying on the Turris Omnia to run LXC containers? Thanks. Source: almost 2 years ago
  • Bought a mini pc to run Proxmox bare metal but the storage is emmc which PM hates. What should I run instead to self host containers and vms?
    Any distribution stable enough and LXD https://linuxcontainers.org/lxd/ for containers and VMs. Source: about 2 years ago
  • Rancher K3s: Kubernetes on Proxmox Containers
    This has been really stable, and has worked pretty well for me. I deploy the applications to a set of LXD containers (read: lightweight Linux VMs) on Proxmox, a free and open-source hypervisor with an excellent management interface. - Source: dev.to / about 3 years ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing AWS Lambda and LXD, you can also consider the following products

Amazon S3 - Amazon S3 is an object storage where users can store data from their business on a safe, cloud-based platform. Amazon S3 operates in 54 availability zones within 18 graphic regions and 1 local region.

runc - CLI tool for spawning and running containers according to the OCI specification - opencontainers/runc

Amazon API Gateway - Create, publish, maintain, monitor, and secure APIs at any scale

Podman - Simple debugging tool for pods and images

Google App Engine - A powerful platform to build web and mobile apps that scale automatically.

Crane - Crane is a docker image builder to approach light-weight ML users who want to expand a container image with custom apt/conda/pip packages without writing any Dockerfile.