Comparing the best Container Orchestration Tools in 2021: Kubernetes vs Mesos vs Swarm

How to pick the best Container Orchestration tool in 2021: Kubernetes vs Mesos vs Swarm

Kubernetes, Docker Swarm and Mesos are the modern choices for container orchestration. Each of these tools has its own pros and cons. Hence finding the perfect cluster management solution for your organization can be difficult. Right now there is no universal standard, meaning that no platform supports all cluster managers at the same time. You will have to choose the one that works for you.

This article will try to give you a high-level overview of Kubernetes, Docker Swarm, and Apache Mesos along with the major differences among them. 

Kubernetes and Docker Swarm support composing multi-container services. They schedule them to run on a cluster on either a physical or virtual machine. Apache Mesos works for data center management and it installs complex applications like Kubernetes on top of data center orchestrators. 

Knowing our Actors: Kubernetes, Docker Swarm and Apache Mesos

Kubernetes

Kubernetes, also known as K8s was released back in 2014. It is written in Golang. Kubernetes is a highly versatile, open-source tool.It supports many container run times, including docker and rkt.

The base unit of deployment in kubernetes is called a Pod which consists of one or more containers. All containers in a Pod are scheduled on the same host. They can communicate with each other over the localhost loopback interface. 

Kubernetes have one optional DNS cluster add-on. It allows for service discovery by name. Services can be exposed in many ways, including Internal only. 

Two notable derivative works are RedHat’s OpenShift Origin and CoreOS’s Tectonic platforms. Both projects are based on Kubernetes with commercially supported features.

Pros of Kubernetes:

• Kubernetes is backed by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) and enjoys good community support.
• Complex cluster management can be done with easy commands with strong authentication and authorization schemes.
• Kubernetes is cost-effective and open-source.
• Offers scalability. It works regardless of how many pods it’s managing.
• Kubernetes is one of the top container orchestration tools used by developers. Kubernetes is a great tool to manage Docker images.
• Kubernetes monitors the health of containers and nodes and promotes the self-healing and auto-replacement of damaged nodes. 
• All major cloud platforms support Kubernetes including AWS, GCP, Azure,Digitalocean, Oracle. 

Cons of Kubernetes:

• Kubernetes is not easy to deploy in platforms other than AWS, Azure, and GCP.
• Kubernetes is a bit complicated and unnecessary in environments where all development is done locally. 
• Sometimes, in many instances, the pods go into an unknown state in which you need to restart the entire node. 
• Kubernetes needs to have a separate set of tools for management, including kubectl CLI.
• Kubernetes can be a hard thing to bring to the team and has a steep learning curve.

You can also read our posts on Why embrace Kubernetes in 2021 and Kubernetes Cheatsheet

10 reasons to embrace Kubernetes in 2021

Kubernetes Cheatsheet for Beginners

Docker Swarm

Docker Swarm was a part of the Docker Engine in 2016. It’s free to use in the Docker Community Edition. You will have community support as a part of Docker Enterprise Edition.

Docker Swarm supports Docker Containers running in Linux. In 2017, Docker containers in Swarm mode were able to run on Windows, too.

Docker Swarm services are defined using Docker Compose File. This file can be used to bring up a group of containers on a single machine. It can also run on multiple machines in Docker Swarm.Docker Swarm has a DNS server out of the box. It allows service discovery by name. Services can be exposed using ingress mode. 

Like other orchestration solutions ( example: OpenStack), Docker Swarm also includes a control layer called managers and a worker layer called “workers”.All services running on both layers are running inside containers.

Pros of Docker Swarm

• Docker Swarm runs at a faster speed. 
• Swarm integrates smoothly with Docker CLI and Docker Compose.
• Docker Swarm offers a simple and fast configuration.
• It is simple and easier to install.
• More lightweight and has less moving parts.
• Less complicated web UI as compared to Kubernetes.

Cons of Docker Swarm

• Swarm offers very limited functionality.
• Docker is a platform-dependent platform which uses Linux agnostic platform. 
• Docker swarm doesn’t provide storage options out of the box.
• The Swarm monitoring is not good.

Apache Mesos

The Apache Mesos Kernel runs on every machine in a data center. It provides resources to applications that run on the top of it, like Hadoop, Spark, and Kubernetes.

Mesos is designed to run other applications on top of it, including Kubernetes. You can run containers directly in Mesos. Choosing a more container-centric application to run on top of Mesos will offer better workflows.

Mesos does not natively support service discovery, not this is a desired feature. Third-party projects will solve this. Apache Mesos runs on other Softwares such as Kubernetes or Docker Swarm. 

Pros of Apache Mesos

• Apache Mesos is good for existing workloads. Mesos makes it easy to use these workloads together.
• It’s good with data processing applications. They can run on the same resource pool, along with new container packaged applications.
• Mesos is used in many large-scale projects. It can support hundreds of thousands of nodes.
• It is fault-tolerant.

Difference between Kubernetes, Docker Swarm, and Apache Mesos

To some extent, Kubernetes, Swarm, and Mesos offer a level of blanket support for all enterprises, regardless of the size. There is no one way to determine which of these three is best for every enterprise. 

Have a look at some major differences between Kubernetes, Docker Swarm, and Apache Mesos.

	Kubernetes	Docker Swarm	Apache Mesos
Cluster Installation	Installation is complex. Extensive use of YAML files to define all services in the cluster. The YAML configuration is unique to Kubernetes,	Easy to install and setup. All components are mostly docker-based. It can be integrated inside ‘systemd’.	Usually easy to install and setup with small clusters. More complex with large groups. Repositories are available for some Linux distributors.
Maturity	Extremely mature. A direct descendant of the Google internal BORG Platform.	Quite mature, but is still evolving.	Very mature. Especially for large clusters counting in the thousands of servers.
Container Deployment	YAML-based for all components in a deployed application.	Fully Docker-based and easy to install.	JSON-based. Application definitions go inside a JSON file which is passed to the Mesos REST API.
Scalability	Medium to large clusters. Well-suited for complex applications with many containers inside pods.	Still evolving. Consider Swarm for small to medium scale setups.	Large to very large scale clusters. The best choice to combine containers and normal applications in the same cluster.
Best Features	It has the best PODS scheduling features when complex applications are needed to be deployed.	Easy and simple to use. More native to Docker.	Scale in the thousands, and rack-based  constraints features available in order to fine-tune where to deploy applications.

Conclusion

So who is the winner among the three? Well there is NO clear winner here .Each of above container orchestration tool has its own set of pros and cons.

We have shared some insights about the three orchestration tools and also a comparison of their core competencies. How to choose one of these, will depend on finding the right cluster management solution that fits your company’s technical and business needs.