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Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE vs VMware Tanzu Platform comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 15, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE
Ranking in Container Management
10th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Container Monitoring (6th)
VMware Tanzu Platform
Ranking in Container Management
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Build Automation (14th), PaaS Clouds (13th), Cloud Management (25th), Development Platforms (3rd), Service Mesh (8th), Agile and DevOps Services (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Container Management category, the mindshare of Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE is 8.2%, up from 7.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Tanzu Platform is 12.5%, down from 17.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Container Management
 

Featured Reviews

Prasanthraj PN - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers efficient deployment and management with easy resource allocation, yet faces challenges in integration and compatibility
Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE offers easy and fast deployment, management, stability, reliability, and cost-effectiveness. The resource allocation is very simple. If we need to expand the memory, storage space, or processor core, it is very easy to manage through our central control. These features are what stand out the most.
DarshanChaudhari - PeerSpot reviewer
Empowers seamless connectivity and integration through APIs while offering robust auto-scaling
I am involved in IT services and we provide a solution to customers. We work with VMware, Nutanix, OpenShift, and Microsoft Hyper-V The Tanzu platform is highly available, scalable, and flexible. It offers native services for autoscaling and integrations through APIs, allowing seamless…

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"We can do a lot of provisioning."
"Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"Nutanix is very stable and reliable, based on my experience with many customers, including large banks and telcos."
"My experience with Nutanix's technical support is excellent."
"The most valuable features of the Nutanix Kubernetes Engine (NKE) are its simplicity and efficiency during the initial cluster creation phase."
"The technical support is excellent."
"The product integrates well with our infrastructure."
"The solution provides no downtime features. If we face issues, we create a new port, deploy it there, and then drop the existing one. This way, we avoid NKE downtime on our website."
"The solution is integrated very well with a lot of other systems. Also, its GUI is very good."
"We feel very good about these features."
"It definitely gives the end customer a good overview and perspective of running applications in terms of overall workload footprint. TMC provides a very detailed description of your cloud-native application in the form of graphical visualization."
"The Tanzu platform is highly available, scalable, and flexible."
"The most important thing about the solution is its flexibility."
"I have multiple Kubernetes environments within my environment. TMC gives me a single pane view, which is good for managing everything."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is the ability to check the flow of all the different variants within our applications."
"The most valuable feature of VMware Tanzu Mission Control is the management functionality of the cluster life cycle. Additionally, the solution integrates well with other vendors, such as Velero for backups and Sonobuoy for compliance. Additionally, it works well in multi-cluster environments."
 

Cons

"We need a backup of production clusters."
"In the next release, I would like to have automatic dynamic scaling, both upscaling and downscaling."
"It's mostly for lab purposes; we haven't seen a lot of traction in the market from enterprise customers yet."
"Areas for improvement in Nutanix Kubernetes Engine (NKE) include upgrading management capabilities and enhancing the user interface for improved usability."
"I would like to have more nodes for availability and storage."
"There is no auto-scaling feature in Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE; however, NKP offers it. In NKE, we created additional worker nodes and increased CPU and RAM capacity, but it required manual intervention."
"One major issue we faced was that appliances couldn't migrate from VMware to the tool. However, this seems to be a common problem across platforms. We've seen the same issue when migrating from VMware to RHV or other solutions. It's not specifically a Nutanix problem but rather an issue migrating appliances from one VM infrastructure to another. Some kernel-level and storage-level issues impact this process."
"I have issues with the product's interoperability."
"Another area of improvement is pricing."
"Tanzu could provide more granular control over whatever networking is being done on the containers. I would also like to see a slightly more detailed view of application-level tracing. I'm referring to the connections between different microservices. If they added a service-matching feature, that would be helpful for the customers to build or be more effective."
"The network control and security policies must be improved."
"Tanzu provides better manageability as compared to OCP, but when it comes to tagging it with other products, it's a bit rigid. If I have to bring in any new product or something out of the box from a different vendor, working with Tanzu becomes a little difficult. For example, if I want to use the F5 services, I have to add one more layer of Avi, but I don't want to do that. If I have a list of the products that I want to use, such as for firewall services, with Tanzu, I will have to go through another layer, which creates complexity."
"Customers have noticed a considerable price increase after VMware's acquisition by Broadcom."
"Having a unified dashboard to manage all infrastructure, whether it involves additional IT infrastructure or modern apps, would be highly advantageous"
"The solution's initial setup process was complex...The solution could benefit from improved customization and visibility for its users."
"The solution is currently focused on VMware infrastructure and I would like to see more options made available."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"While deploying Kubernetes clusters on Nutanix is cost-effective, there may be additional costs for remote branch offices where Kubernetes is less common."
"I rate the product price a five on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"The product's licenses are included in the software version deployed in our data center."
"The platform is averagely priced. I rate the pricing as four out of ten."
"I rate NKE's pricing a six out of ten."
"The licensing cost is expensive."
"One of our Spanish customers told us that VMware Tanzu Service Mesh is a very expensive product for their data center."
"Its pricing is very competitive. We get around 70% or 75%, sometimes even 80%, discount on the product. I would rate it a four out of five in terms of pricing."
"Since we were at a large data center, the price might not have been a concern for us."
"VMware Tanzu Mission Control is cheaper than Red Hat OpenShift."
"The product is not expensive, but it is not cheap."
"I would recommend that businesses look into the full price for their requirements. The price is high, but there are some open-source add-ons that can be used for customization while keeping costs down, although these might not be suitable for everyone."
"The solution is bundled in with Cloud Foundry so the pricing is not independent."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE?
The most valuable features of the Nutanix Kubernetes Engine (NKE) are its simplicity and efficiency during the initial cluster creation phase.
What needs improvement with Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE?
I have heard there are many features added in NKP that are not available in Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE, such as load balancer features. The unified control plane feature is not being used in Nut...
What is your primary use case for Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE?
I have been working with the Nutanix Kubernetes platform for the past five years. Currently, I am supporting JetBlue Airlines in America, which uses a Nutanix environment and Nutanix Kubernetes Eng...
Which is better - OpenShift Container Platform or VMware Tanzu Mission Control?
Red Hat Openshift is ideal for organizations using microservices and cloud environments. I like that the platform is auto-scalable, which saves overhead time for developers. I think Openshift can b...
What do you like most about VMware Tanzu Mission Control?
It definitely gives the end customer a good overview and perspective of running applications in terms of overall workload footprint. TMC provides a very detailed description of your cloud-native ap...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware Tanzu Mission Control?
The price of VMware Tanzu Mission Control is greater than that of Red Hat's competitor solution. I would rate the pricing of VMware Tanzu Mission Control as four out of ten.
 

Also Known As

Nutanix Karbon
Tanzu Application Catalog, Application Platform, Application Service, Hub, Mission Control, Service Mesh, Build Service, Concourse for VMware Tanzu
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

JetBlue, International Speedway Corporation, SAIC Volkswagen
Verizon, Cerner, Zipcar, Avarteq
Find out what your peers are saying about Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE vs. VMware Tanzu Platform and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,164 professionals have used our research since 2012.