What is our primary use case?
I have been working in the DevOps field and platform engineering field for around two years, approximately 1.9 years. During this time, I have worked on Linux, Kubernetes, OpenShift, Rancher, SUSE Manager, and SUSE AI, mainly focusing on deployment, administration, and troubleshooting.
Our primary use case for SUSE Rancher is Kubernetes cluster management. We use it to provision and manage our RKE2 clusters across different environments. On a daily basis, I monitor cluster health, check node status, manage user access with the help of RBAC role-based access control, deploy applications using Helm charts or manual deployment, and troubleshoot issues. I also perform cluster upgrades whenever required. We use SUSE Rancher to manage multiple clusters from a single dashboard. Instead of logging into each cluster separately, we monitor workloads, namespaces, and pods from one single place. If any node goes into Not Ready status or starts failing, we first check it in SUSE Rancher, and then we use kubectl and system logs to investigate the root cause. SUSE Rancher makes overall system administration much easier for us.
What is most valuable?
Compared to managing clusters separately, SUSE Rancher definitely saves us a lot of time because we can manage multiple Kubernetes clusters from one single dashboard. Instead of logging into each cluster manually or separately, it gives me a centralized view of cluster health, nodes, workload, and namespaces. We can give any user access to the platform. For example, if any worker node goes into Not Ready status, a pod goes into a crash loop, or any troubleshooting issue happens such as an image pull back off error, I can quickly identify which cluster is affected from SUSE Rancher. Then I use kubectl commands and node logs to troubleshoot the issues. It simplifies cluster upgrades and RBAC management with fewer manual steps, which helps me reduce configuration errors and makes my day-to-day operations much easier.
With SUSE Rancher, everything is in one place and centralized. Daily operations are much faster and easier for us. I don't have exact metrics, but from my experience, routine tasks such as checking cluster health, managing users, and deploying applications are noticeably quicker, and we can react very quickly. It has reduced manual efforts and helped us troubleshoot issues faster because we get a single view from all our clusters. Overall, it has improved our team efficiency and consistency.
Before SUSE Rancher, we mainly managed Kubernetes clusters using kubectl and directly the Kubernetes dashboard UI. While that works well, it becomes difficult when you have multiple clusters because you have to switch from one cluster to another. We adopted SUSE Rancher because it provides a centralized platform for cluster management, multi-cluster management, simplifies RBAC, cluster provisioning, upgrades, and monitoring. It made our day-to-day operations much easier and efficient and reduced our time switching between different clusters.
What needs improvement?
I am happy with SUSE Rancher, but there are a few areas where it could be improved. During major version upgrades, the process can become a bit complex, especially in air-gapped environments where image management and dependencies require extra planning. Additionally, troubleshooting sometimes still requires switching to the command line because not every error is visible in the UI. If the UI provided more detailed diagnostic and troubleshooting information, it would make our issue resolution even faster. Other than that, it has been a reliable platform for all of us.
I think the documentation is already very good, but for complex scenarios such as air-gapped environments, disaster recovery, or multi-cluster upgrades, having more step-by-step examples and troubleshooting guides would be very helpful. On the UI side, if SUSE Rancher could provide more detailed error messages and built-in diagnostic recognition, it would reduce the need to switch to logs and command lines. Those improvements would make our daily operations even easier and smoother, especially for new administrators and fresh team members.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using SUSE Rancher for around 1.5 to 2 years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
SUSE Rancher has been very stable in my experience. We haven't faced any major downtime caused by SUSE Rancher itself. Most of the issues we encountered were related to the underlying Kubernetes cluster, networking, or infrastructure rather than SUSE Rancher platform. For day-to-day cluster management, monitoring, and upgrades, it has been reliable and has performed very well. As long as it is deployed and maintained properly, we have had a very good experience with the stability of SUSE Rancher.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
SUSE Rancher scales very well. As the number of Kubernetes clusters grows, it helps provide a single place to manage all of them, so the operational overhead doesn't increase as much. We have been able to manage multiple clusters, users, and workloads without any major issues. It also makes it easy to apply consistent configuration and access control across clusters. I haven't faced any significant scalability challenges with SUSE Rancher itself. Most scaling considerations are usually related to the underlying Kubernetes infrastructure rather than the SUSE Rancher management.
How are customer service and support?
We have interacted with SUSE support a few times for complex issues that couldn't be resolved internally. Overall, my experience has been positive. The support engineer was knowledgeable and very friendly, responded within the expected SLA, and helped us troubleshoot issues by reviewing logs and suggesting appropriate steps for most day-to-day issues. We rely mostly on our internal team and documentation. We didn't rely heavily on SUSE support. However, in one important case, we needed a license for SUSE Rancher and the key was not working. We contacted the SUSE support team and they helped us by providing a new key for our organization.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Before SUSE Rancher, we mainly managed Kubernetes clusters using kubectl and directly the Kubernetes dashboard UI. While that works well, it becomes difficult when you have multiple clusters because you have to switch from one cluster to another. We adopted SUSE Rancher because it provides a centralized platform for cluster management, multi-cluster management, simplifies RBAC, cluster provisioning, upgrades, and monitoring. It made our day-to-day operations much easier and efficient and reduced our time switching between different clusters.
Our team did look at a few other options. We considered managing clusters with native Kubernetes tools, kubectl, and we also looked at Red Hat OpenShift for some use cases. In the end, we chose SUSE Rancher because it provides us centralized multi-cluster management and supports RKE2 in both air-gapped and connected environments. It was a good fit for our infrastructure and also makes cluster administration and upgrades much easier and simpler for our operations teams.
How was the initial setup?
My name is Shivam Kachore. Currently, I am working as an Associate System Engineer at Dhanya Enterprises Private Limited. I have been mainly working in the DevOps and platform engineering domain. My day-to-day work involves Kubernetes, OpenShift, SUSE Rancher, and SUSE Manager. I have worked on both connected and air-gapped environments, where I was involved in cluster deployment, lifecycle management, troubleshooting, and ongoing platform support. In Kubernetes, I have worked on deployments, statefulsets, daemonsets, services, ingress, config maps, secrets, RBAC, persistent volume claims, storage classes, and networking. Along with Kubernetes, I have also worked on SUSE Manager and all the SUSE products.
What about the implementation team?
We didn't purchase SUSE Rancher through the AWS Marketplace. Our company, Dhanya Enterprises Private Limited, is a SUSE Premier partner. We directly work with SUSE for licensing, support, and product access rather than purchasing through the AWS Marketplace.
What was our ROI?
We have definitely seen a positive return from my experience. I don't have exact numbers because I don't track business metrics. But from an operational perspective, it has saved a lot of time since SUSE Rancher centralizes cluster management. Our team spends less time switching between clusters and performing respective administrative tasks. It has also reduced manual configuration errors and made troubleshooting much easier and faster. Overall, we have been able to manage multiple clusters efficiently with the same operations team. It has definitely improved our productivity.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I wasn't directly involved in the commercial side such as pricing, negotiation, or licensing decisions. Since we are a SUSE partner, those discussions were handled by our management and sales team. From the technical side, the licensing process was straightforward and we didn't face any issues during deployment or activation. My focus was mainly on installation, cluster deployment, upgrades, and day-to-day administration rather than pricing.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Our team did look at a few other options. We considered managing clusters with native Kubernetes tools, kubectl, and we also looked at Red Hat OpenShift for some use cases. In the end, we chose SUSE Rancher because it provides us centralized multi-cluster management and supports RKE2 in both air-gapped and connected environments. It was a good fit for our infrastructure and also makes cluster administration and upgrades much easier and simpler for our operations teams.
What other advice do I have?
My advice would be to first understand Kubernetes fundamentals before adopting SUSE Rancher fully because SUSE Rancher simplifies Kubernetes management, but it doesn't replace Kubernetes knowledge. Also, plan your architecture carefully and especially spend time on that. If you are deploying in an air-gapped or production environment, follow the best practices for backup, RBAC, monitoring, and upgrades. If it's implemented properly, SUSE Rancher is the most reliable platform that makes managing multiple clusters much easier and more efficient. I would rate this product a 9 overall.