

Find out in this report how the two Container Security solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
We see a return on investment with Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), as we no longer manage the control plane ourselves, which saves us a lot of time and employee effort.
It definitely saved time and manpower.
Rather than dealing with three employees, after implementing SUSE Rancher Manager, we are able to do it with a single employee, which ultimately saves the cost.
The end-to-end deployment was at least 30 percent cheaper than OpenShift, which was the biggest criterion since customers are cost-conscious.
They are very fast to respond and begin analysis to resolve problems.
Customer support for Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) is typically good, but in some instances where technical expertise is required, I sometimes feel I know more than the support personnel.
The customer support is very friendly, and they are very fast in addressing the issues.
Since we were the partner for deployment, customer support was especially robust from the presales team at SUSE.
SUSE Rancher's customer support is performing well.
AKS offers excellent scalability due to its adaptation from Kubernetes.
The scalability of Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) is one of the best I have experienced in the market.
SUSE Rancher's scalability is working with high performance, and it can handle growth and additional clusters easily based on my experience.
It uses HPA in the backend, so horizontal pod autoscaling is by default inherited in SUSE Rancher.
SUSE Rancher's scalability is effective; I do not think there is an issue with it.
From my usage, I would rate its stability as eight to nine out of ten.
It's very stable, and the support is satisfactory.
The tool is working fine with SUSE without any downtimes, technical issues, or critical errors.
There are some areas where it can improve, such as on the stability and reliability side.
SUSE Rancher is stable, and I have used it for monitoring my Kubernetes cluster.
The costs are rising rapidly, and we have not seen any cost reductions by moving to Azure.
It is costly compared to other solutions such as Canonical.
I do not see any specific areas for improvement in Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), except for the kind of support they provide.
The most pressing issue that I found in SUSE Rancher is that it is a bit slow. Compared with Komodor, it is very slow.
I wish the container could be more lightweight so that anyone can test and verify SUSE Rancher Prime.
One of the major challenges I faced with SUSE Rancher was during a POC for one customer who was using VMware. There was a significant challenge between VMware CSI and SUSE integrations.
Transitioning to Azure did not bring cost reductions; in fact, costs are rising rapidly.
The solution is very expensive in my opinion.
My experience with pricing, setup costs, and licensing for Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) involves booking quotas for commitments of three to five years to receive significant discounts.
Rancher is free of cost for us as it is open source.
It is a very good tool to use, and it has a very good costing structure.
Licensing, which is per unit based, was straightforward.
The most valuable features of Azure Kubernetes Service are its integration with Kubernetes, offering similar features for a seamless experience.
Since pricing is not a major concern, we chose the best fit for our application, which was specifically designed for this particular platform.
The integration with Azure Active Directory helped with the security of our applications.
We use Rancher Desktop for local development, testing APIs locally, and it helps to seamlessly publish to the cloud.
SUSE Rancher has impacted my organization positively by enabling us to identify issues before they happen through monitoring utilizations and node pressure.
The openness helped in integrating the existing tools with SUSE Rancher itself, which was the biggest use case.
| Product | Mindshare (%) |
|---|---|
| SUSE Rancher | 0.5% |
| Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) | 0.9% |
| Other | 98.6% |

| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 15 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 7 |
| Large Enterprise | 23 |
| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 3 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 1 |
| Large Enterprise | 4 |
Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) is a fully managed container orchestration service provided by Microsoft Azure. It simplifies the deployment, management, and scaling of containerized applications using Kubernetes. With AKS, developers can focus on building applications while Azure takes care of the underlying infrastructure. It offers features like automatic scaling, monitoring, and security, ensuring high availability and reliability. AKS integrates seamlessly with other Azure services, enabling easy integration with existing workflows. It also provides a flexible and open-source environment, allowing developers to use their preferred tools and frameworks. With AKS, organizations can accelerate their application development and deployment processes, while reducing operational overheads.
SUSE Rancher manages and deploys Kubernetes clusters, simplifies container orchestration, and enhances DevOps practices, supporting multi-cloud environments and facilitating application scalability and monitoring.
SUSE Rancher provides robust Kubernetes cluster management and seamless integration with different tools and platforms, making it valuable for complex cloud infrastructures. It aids in automating workflows, ensuring consistent application performance across environments, and enhancing security with reliable RBAC. It simplifies operations with automated updates and comprehensive monitoring tools, supporting multiple Kubernetes distributions. SUSE Rancher offers centralized management of clusters with an intuitive experience, though it may benefit from better stability, performance optimizations, and improved documentation clarity.
What are the important features?SUSE Rancher is implemented in various industries where managing Kubernetes clusters and ensuring application scalability are critical. It supports complex cloud infrastructures, automating workflows, and integrating seamlessly with different tools, enhancing overall operational efficiency and security. In industries needing consistent performance and centralized management, SUSE Rancher proves to be an invaluable tool.
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