Picking the Right Solution
Kubernetes can run on a range of platforms, from your laptop, to VMs on a cloud provider, to rack of bare metal servers. The effort required to set up a cluster varies from running a single command to crafting your own customized cluster. We’ll guide you in picking a solution that fits for your needs.
If you just want to “kick the tires” on Kubernetes, we recommend the local Docker-based solution.
The local Docker-based solution is one of several Local cluster solutions that are quick to set up, but are limited to running on one machine.
When you are ready to scale up to more machines and higher availability, a Hosted solution is the easiest to create and maintain.
Turn-key cloud solutions require only a few commands to create and cover a wider range of cloud providers.
Custom solutions require more effort to setup but cover and even they vary from step-by-step instructions to general advice for setting up a Kubernetes cluster from scratch.
- Local-machine Solutions
- Hosted Solutions
- Turn-key Cloud Solutions
- Custom Solutions
- Table of Solutions
Local-machine Solutions
Local-machine solutions create a single cluster with one or more Kubernetes nodes on a single physical machine. Setup is completely automated and doesn’t require a cloud provider account. But their size and availability is limited to that of a single machine.
The local-machine solutions are:
- Local Docker-based (recommended starting point)
- No-VM local cluster (Linux only)
Hosted Solutions
Google Container Engine offers managed Kubernetes clusters.
Turn-key Cloud Solutions
These solutions allow you to create Kubernetes clusters on a range of Cloud IaaS providers with only a few commands, and have active community support.
Custom Solutions
Kubernetes can run on a wide range of Cloud providers and bare-metal environments, and with many base operating systems.
If you can find a guide below that matches your needs, use it. It may be a little out of date, but it will be easier than starting from scratch. If you do want to start from scratch because you have special requirements or just because you want to understand what is underneath a Kubernetes cluster, try the Getting Started from Scratch guide.
If you are interested in supporting Kubernetes on a new platform, check out our advice for writing a new solution.
Cloud
These solutions are combinations of cloud provider and OS not covered by the above solutions.
On-Premises VMs
- Vagrant (uses CoreOS and flannel)
- CloudStack (uses Ansible, CoreOS and flannel)
- Vmware (uses Debian)
- juju.md (uses Juju, Ubuntu and flannel)
- Vmware (uses CoreOS and flannel)
- libvirt-coreos.md (uses CoreOS)
- oVirt
- OpenStack Heat (uses CentOS and flannel)
- libvirt (uses Fedora and flannel)
- KVM (uses Fedora and flannel)
Bare Metal
- Offline (no internet required. Uses CoreOS and Flannel)
- fedora/fedora_ansible_config.md
- Fedora single node
- Fedora multi node
- Centos
- Ubuntu
- Docker Multi Node
Integrations
These solutions provide integration with 3rd party schedulers, resource managers, and/or lower level platforms.
- Kubernetes on Mesos
- Instructions specify GCE, but are generic enough to be adapted to most existing Mesos clusters
- Kubernetes on DCOS
- Community Edition DCOS uses AWS
- Enterprise Edition DCOS supports cloud hosting, on-premise VMs, and bare metal
Table of Solutions
Here are all the solutions mentioned above in table form.
| IaaS Provider | Config. Mgmt | OS | Networking | Docs | Conforms | Support Level |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GKE | GCE | docs | ‘œ“ | Commercial | ||
| GCE | Saltstack | Debian | GCE | docs | ‘œ“ | Project |
| Azure | CoreOS | CoreOS | Weave | docs | Community (@errordeveloper, @squillace, @chanezon, @crossorigin) | |
| Docker Single Node | custom | N/A | local | docs | Project (@brendandburns) | |
| Docker Multi Node | custom | N/A | flannel | docs | Project (@brendandburns) | |
| Bare-metal | Ansible | Fedora | flannel | docs | Project | |
| Bare-metal | custom | Fedora | none | docs | Project | |
| Bare-metal | custom | Fedora | flannel | docs | Community (@aveshagarwal) | |
| libvirt | custom | Fedora | flannel | docs | Community (@aveshagarwal) | |
| KVM | custom | Fedora | flannel | docs | Community (@aveshagarwal) | |
| Mesos/Docker | custom | Ubuntu | Docker | docs | Community (Kubernetes-Mesos Authors) | |
| Mesos/GCE | docs | Community (Kubernetes-Mesos Authors) | ||||
| DCOS | Marathon | CoreOS/Alpine | custom | docs | Community (Kubernetes-Mesos Authors) | |
| AWS | CoreOS | CoreOS | flannel | docs | Community | |
| GCE | CoreOS | CoreOS | flannel | docs | Community (@pires) | |
| Vagrant | CoreOS | CoreOS | flannel | docs | Community (@pires, @AntonioMeireles) | |
| Bare-metal (Offline) | CoreOS | CoreOS | flannel | docs | Community (@jeffbean) | |
| Bare-metal | CoreOS | CoreOS | Calico | docs | Community (@caseydavenport) | |
| CloudStack | Ansible | CoreOS | flannel | docs | Community (@runseb) | |
| Vmware | Debian | OVS | docs | Community (@pietern) | ||
| Bare-metal | custom | CentOS | none | docs | Community (@coolsvap) | |
| AWS | Juju | Ubuntu | flannel | docs | Community ( @whit, @matt, @chuck ) | |
| OpenStack/HPCloud | Juju | Ubuntu | flannel | docs | Community ( @whit, @matt, @chuck ) | |
| Joyent | Juju | Ubuntu | flannel | docs | Community ( @whit, @matt, @chuck ) | |
| AWS | Saltstack | Ubuntu | OVS | docs | Community (@justinsb) | |
| Bare-metal | custom | Ubuntu | Calico | docs | Community (@djosborne) | |
| Bare-metal | custom | Ubuntu | flannel | docs | Community (@resouer, @WIZARD-CXY) | |
| libvirt/KVM | CoreOS | CoreOS | libvirt/KVM | docs | Community (@lhuard1A) | |
| oVirt | docs | Community (@simon3z) | ||||
| OpenStack Heat | Saltstack | CentOS | Neutron + flannel hostgw | docs | Community (@FujitsuEnablingSoftwareTechnologyGmbH) | |
| Rackspace | CoreOS | CoreOS | flannel | docs | Community (@doublerr) | |
| any | any | any | any | docs | Community (@erictune) |
Note: The above table is ordered by version test/used in notes followed by support level.
Definition of columns:
- IaaS Provider is who/what provides the virtual or physical machines (nodes) that Kubernetes runs on.
- OS is the base operating system of the nodes.
- Config. Mgmt is the configuration management system that helps install and maintain Kubernetes software on the nodes.
- Networking is what implements the networking model. Those with networking type none may not support more than one node, or may support multiple VM nodes only in the same physical node.
- Conformance indicates whether a cluster created with this configuration has passed the project’s conformance tests for supporting the API and base features of Kubernetes v1.0.0.
- Support Levels
- Project: Kubernetes Committers regularly use this configuration, so it usually works with the latest release of Kubernetes.
- Commercial: A commercial offering with its own support arrangements.
- Community: Actively supported by community contributions. May not work with more recent releases of Kubernetes.
- Inactive: No active maintainer. Not recommended for first-time Kubernetes users, and may be deleted soon.
- Notes is relevant information such as the version of Kubernetes used.