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  1. Stackups
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  4. Container Tools
  5. Kind vs minikube

Kind vs minikube

OverviewComparisonAlternatives

Overview

minikube
minikube
Stacks110
Followers262
Votes3
GitHub Stars31.1K
Forks5.1K
Kind
Kind
Stacks26
Followers59
Votes0
GitHub Stars14.7K
Forks1.7K

Kind vs minikube: What are the differences?

Kind and Minikube are both tools that facilitate the setup and management of Kubernetes clusters. Let's explore the key differences between the two:

  1. Architecture: Kind and Minikube differ in their architecture. Kind creates lightweight Kubernetes clusters inside Docker containers, whereas Minikube sets up a single-node Kubernetes cluster on a local machine.

  2. Deployment: Kind is primarily designed for local development and testing purposes, offering a quick and easy way to spin up multiple clusters. On the other hand, Minikube provides a full Kubernetes implementation for local development, including features like load balancing, secrets, and persistent volumes.

  3. Scalability: Kind is not designed for scalability and is best suited for scenarios involving small clusters. In contrast, Minikube offers options for configuring the resources of the local Kubernetes cluster, making it more suitable for testing larger-scale deployments.

  4. Compatibility: Kind aims to be compatible with production Kubernetes, minimizing any incompatibilities or surprises when moving from a development cluster to a real production environment. Minikube, while providing a local Kubernetes environment, may not accurately mirror all aspects of a production cluster.

  5. Version Support: Kind can create Kubernetes clusters running specific versions of Kubernetes, allowing for testing and compatibility verification with different versions. Minikube, on the other hand, is primarily focused on running the latest stable version of Kubernetes.

  6. Resource Requirements: Due to its lightweight architecture, Kind requires fewer system resources compared to Minikube. This makes Kind a better choice for scenarios where resource constraints are a concern.

In summary, Kind is suitable for lightweight development and testing, while Minikube provides a more comprehensive local Kubernetes environment.

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Detailed Comparison

minikube
minikube
Kind
Kind

It implements a local Kubernetes cluster on macOS, Linux, and Windows. Its goal is to be the tool for local Kubernetes application development and to support all Kubernetes features that fit.

It is a tool for running local Kubernetes clusters using Docker container “nodes”. It was primarily designed for testing Kubernetes itself, but may be used for local development or CI.

Local Kubernetes; LoadBalancer; Multi-cluster
Supports multi-node (including HA) clusters; Supports building Kubernetes release builds from source; Support for make / bash / docker, or bazel, in addition to pre-published builds; Supports Linux, macOS and Windows; It is a CNCF certified conformant Kubernetes installer
Statistics
GitHub Stars
31.1K
GitHub Stars
14.7K
GitHub Forks
5.1K
GitHub Forks
1.7K
Stacks
110
Stacks
26
Followers
262
Followers
59
Votes
3
Votes
0
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 1
    Let's me test k8s config locally
  • 1
    Easy setup
  • 1
    Can use same yaml config I'll use for prod deployment
No community feedback yet
Integrations
Windows
Windows
Linux
Linux
macOS
macOS
Docker
Docker
Kubernetes
Kubernetes
Bazel
Bazel

What are some alternatives to minikube, Kind?

Kubernetes

Kubernetes

Kubernetes is an open source orchestration system for Docker containers. It handles scheduling onto nodes in a compute cluster and actively manages workloads to ensure that their state matches the users declared intentions.

Rancher

Rancher

Rancher is an open source container management platform that includes full distributions of Kubernetes, Apache Mesos and Docker Swarm, and makes it simple to operate container clusters on any cloud or infrastructure platform.

Docker Compose

Docker Compose

With Compose, you define a multi-container application in a single file, then spin your application up in a single command which does everything that needs to be done to get it running.

Docker Swarm

Docker Swarm

Swarm serves the standard Docker API, so any tool which already communicates with a Docker daemon can use Swarm to transparently scale to multiple hosts: Dokku, Compose, Krane, Deis, DockerUI, Shipyard, Drone, Jenkins... and, of course, the Docker client itself.

Tutum

Tutum

Tutum lets developers easily manage and run lightweight, portable, self-sufficient containers from any application. AWS-like control, Heroku-like ease. The same container that a developer builds and tests on a laptop can run at scale in Tutum.

Portainer

Portainer

It is a universal container management tool. It works with Kubernetes, Docker, Docker Swarm and Azure ACI. It allows you to manage containers without needing to know platform-specific code.

Codefresh

Codefresh

Automate and parallelize testing. Codefresh allows teams to spin up on-demand compositions to run unit and integration tests as part of the continuous integration process. Jenkins integration allows more complex pipelines.

CAST.AI

CAST.AI

It is an AI-driven cloud optimization platform for Kubernetes. Instantly cut your cloud bill, prevent downtime, and 10X the power of DevOps.

k3s

k3s

Certified Kubernetes distribution designed for production workloads in unattended, resource-constrained, remote locations or inside IoT appliances. Supports something as small as a Raspberry Pi or as large as an AWS a1.4xlarge 32GiB server.

Flocker

Flocker

Flocker is a data volume manager and multi-host Docker cluster management tool. With it you can control your data using the same tools you use for your stateless applications. This means that you can run your databases, queues and key-value stores in Docker and move them around as easily as the rest of your app.

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