What is DigitalOcean Kubernetes used for?

DigitalOcean Kubernetes is a managed Kubernetes service with a free control plane, simple scaling and GPU-powered options for small teams. It is a good fit for small teams running containers without heavy operations, scaling workloads with GPUs and automating deployment pipelines.

How much does DigitalOcean Kubernetes cost?

Paid plans for DigitalOcean Kubernetes start at $12 per month, and there is no free plan.

Is DigitalOcean Kubernetes open source?

No. DigitalOcean Kubernetes is proprietary (closed-source) software and can't be self-hosted. Open-source alternatives to DigitalOcean Kubernetes include Kubernetes, K3s and Rancher.

What are some alternatives to DigitalOcean Kubernetes?

DigitalOcean Kubernetes competes with Amazon EKS, Google Kubernetes Engine and Azure Kubernetes Service. For open-source options, see Enlisted's ranked list of open-source DigitalOcean Kubernetes alternatives.

DigitalOcean Kubernetes: features, pricing and alternatives

About DigitalOcean Kubernetes

DigitalOcean Kubernetes, known as DOKS, is a managed Kubernetes service from DigitalOcean aimed at small businesses and developers. The vendor says it fully manages the control plane, which can be operated through the DigitalOcean API, command-line tool or web interface.

Listed benefits include a free control plane, easy scaling and quick deployments, plus reliability features such as fault tolerance, load balancing and traffic management. An optional high-availability control plane can be added for important clusters. The service also supports spinning up GPU-powered environments and automating infrastructure and software delivery.

DOKS is a proprietary, cloud-hosted service. The vendor advertises clusters starting at 12 dollars per month, with full pricing on the DigitalOcean pricing page.

Key features

Fully managed Kubernetes control plane
Free control plane
Scaling of workloads and node pools
Optional high-availability control plane
GPU-powered environments
Management via API, CLI and UI

Good fit for

→Small teams running containers without heavy operations
→Scaling workloads with GPUs
→Automating deployment pipelines

Tags: kubernetes; managed-kubernetes; digitalocean; containers; gpu; managed-service

DigitalOcean Kubernetes: questions and answers

What is DigitalOcean Kubernetes used for?: DigitalOcean Kubernetes is a managed Kubernetes service with a free control plane, simple scaling and GPU-powered options for small teams. It is a good fit for small teams running containers without heavy operations, scaling workloads with GPUs and automating deployment pipelines.
How much does DigitalOcean Kubernetes cost?: Paid plans for DigitalOcean Kubernetes start at $12 per month, and there is no free plan.
Is DigitalOcean Kubernetes open source?: No. DigitalOcean Kubernetes is proprietary (closed-source) software and can't be self-hosted. Open-source alternatives to DigitalOcean Kubernetes include Kubernetes, K3s and Rancher.
What are some alternatives to DigitalOcean Kubernetes?: DigitalOcean Kubernetes competes with Amazon EKS, Google Kubernetes Engine and Azure Kubernetes Service. For open-source options, see Enlisted's ranked list of open-source DigitalOcean Kubernetes alternatives.