Software Alternatives & Reviews

k3s VS Kubernetes

Compare k3s VS Kubernetes and see what are their differences

k3s logo k3s

K3s is a lightweight Kubernetes distribution by Rancher Labs intended for IoT, Edge, and cloud deployments.

Kubernetes logo Kubernetes

Kubernetes is an open source orchestration system for Docker containers
  • k3s Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-11-09
  • Kubernetes Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-07-24

k3s videos

Siroko K3s Sun Glasses Unboxing and Review | Big Muscle Gains

More videos:

  • Review - Elecraft K3S Transceiver Review

Kubernetes videos

Kubernetes in 5 mins

More videos:

  • Review - Kubernetes Documentation
  • Review - Module 1: Istio - Kubernetes - Getting Started - Installation and Sample Application Review
  • Review - Deploying WordPress on Kubernetes, Step-by-Step

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to k3s and Kubernetes)
DevOps Tools
15 15%
85% 85
Developer Tools
11 11%
89% 89
Cloud Computing
25 25%
75% 75
IT Automation
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare k3s and Kubernetes

k3s Reviews

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Kubernetes Reviews

The Top 7 Kubernetes Alternatives for Container Orchestration
Rancher RKE is an interface to the command line for Rancher Kubernetes Engine (RKE) and OpenShift. Both are software tools employed to deploy Kubernetes, an open source project that manages containers on several hosts.
Kubernetes Alternatives 2023: Top 8 Container Orchestration Tools
Azure Kubernetes Service is a container orchestration platform that offers secure serverless Kubernetes. AKS helps to manage Kubernetes clusters and makes deploying containerized applications so much easier. In addition to that, it provides automatic configuration of all Kubernetes nodes and master.
Top 12 Kubernetes Alternatives to Choose From in 2023
Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) is a prominent choice for a Kubernetes alternative. It is provided and managed by Google Cloud, which offers fully managed Kubernetes services.
Source: humalect.com
Docker Swarm vs Kubernetes: how to choose a container orchestration tool
In this article, we explored the two primary orchestrators of the container world, Kubernetes and Docker Swarm. Docker Swarm is a lightweight, easy-to-use orchestration tool with limited offerings compared to Kubernetes. In contrast, Kubernetes is complex but powerful and provides self-healing, auto-scaling capabilities out of the box. K3s, a lightweight form of Kubernetes...
Source: circleci.com
Docker Alternatives
An open-source code, Rancher is another one among the list of Docker alternatives that is built to provide organizations with everything they need. This software combines the environments required to adopt and run containers in production. A rancher is built on Kubernetes. This tool helps the DevOps team by making it easier to testing, deploying and managing the...
Source: www.educba.com

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Kubernetes should be more popular than k3s. It has been mentiond 280 times since March 2021. 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.

k3s mentions (159)

  • Linux fu: getting started with systemd
    For self-hosting I've found https://k3s.io to be really good from the SUSE people. Works on basically any Linux distro and makes self-hosting k8s not miserable. - Source: Hacker News / 13 days ago
  • 15 Options To Build A Kubernetes Playground (with Pros and Cons)
    K3S: is a lightweight distribution of Kubernetes that is designed for resource-constrained environments. It is an excellent option for running Kubernetes on a virtual machine or cloud server. - Source: dev.to / 3 months ago
  • K3s Traefik Ingress - configured for your homelab!
    I recently purchased a used Lenovo M900 Think Centre (i7 with 32GB RAM) from eBay to expand my mini-homelab, which was just a single Synology DS218+ plugged into my ISP's router (yuck!). Since I've been spending a big chunk of time at work playing around with Kubernetes, I figured that I'd put my skills to the test and run a k3s node on the new server. While I was familiar with k3s before starting this project,... - Source: dev.to / 4 months ago
  • Building a no-code Helm UI with Windmill - Part 1
    I’ve created a local cluster with K3S and installing Windmill could not be simpler with just one chart to configure, which already has sane defaults to get started. For this demo we will also configure workers to passthrough environment variables to our scripts so that they have access to the Kubernetes API server for later. - Source: dev.to / 5 months ago
  • Highly scalable Minecraft cluster
    You should be familiar with Kubernetes and have set up a Kubernetes cluster. I recommend k3s. - Source: dev.to / 6 months ago
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Kubernetes mentions (280)

  • My Favorite DevTools to Build AI/ML Applications!
    Deploying AI models into production requires tools that can package applications and manage them at scale. Docker simplifies the deployment of AI applications by containerizing them, ensuring that the application runs smoothly in any environment. Kubernetes, an orchestration system for Docker containers, allows for the automated deployment, scaling, and management of containerized applications, essential for AI... - Source: dev.to / 3 days ago
  • Building Scalable GraphQL Microservices With Node.js and Docker: A Comprehensive Guide
    To learn more, you can start by exploring the official Kubernetes documentation. - Source: dev.to / 17 days ago
  • The power of the CLI with Golang and Cobra CLI
    This package is widely used for powerful CLI builds, it is used for example for Kubernetes CLI and GitHub CLI, in addition to offering some cool features such as automatic completion of shell, automatic recognition of flags (the tags) , and you can use -h or -help for example, among other facilities. - Source: dev.to / 21 days ago
  • Kubernetes and back – Why I don't run distributed systems
    "You are holding it wrong", huh? From the homepage https://kubernetes.io/: "Kubernetes, also known as K8s, is an open-source system for automating deployment, scaling, and management of containerized applications." Do you see "not recommended for smaller-scale applications" anywhere? Including on the entire home page? Looking for "small", "big" and "large" also yields nothing. - Source: Hacker News / about 1 month ago
  • Open Source Ascendant: The Transformation of Software Development in 2024
    Open Source and Cloud Computing: A Match Made in Heaven The cloud is accelerating OSS adoption. Cloud-native technologies like Kubernetes [https://kubernetes.io/] and Istio [https://istio.io/], both open-source projects, are revolutionizing how applications are built and deployed across cloud platforms. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing k3s and Kubernetes, you can also consider the following products

k3sup - from Zero to KUBECONFIG in < 1 min 🚀. Contribute to alexellis/k3sup development by creating an account on GitHub.

Rancher - Open Source Platform for Running a Private Container Service

Docker - Docker is an open platform that enables developers and system administrators to create distributed applications.

Portainer - Simple management UI for Docker

Helm.sh - The Kubernetes Package Manager

Kind - Kind is a web-based tool that provides you the features to operate the local kubernetes clusters with the help of a docker container named nodes.