DEVOPSdigest

In case you missed it, Kubernetes turned ten this summer. It's the perfect opportunity to reflect on how far cloud-native has come, and what the next ten years might hold. 

So to commemorate the occasion, here are ten top findings from Spectro Cloud's new 2024 State of Production Kubernetes report.

1. Multi-cluster, multi-environment is the new normal

The average Kubernetes adopter now operates more than 20 clusters, and half of businesses run their clusters in four or more environments (clouds, data centers, edge and so on).

Partly this trend is driven by organic growth, but partly too by a strategic approach to multitenancy — the majority of businesses deliberately separate their workloads across multiple clusters for availability and security.

2. The learning curve has caused real damage

It's a running joke that Kubernetes is hard — but the joke risks trivializing a very real issue.

Three quarters of businesses that use Kubernetes today say their adoption of K8s has actually been inhibited by the complexity of managing it, and by difficulties accessing the right talent and skills.

As one DevOps engineer put it: "Our biggest issue is how complex it is to the layperson. It slowed us down dramatically. We could have been at least twice as far as we are now."

3. Kubernetes is maturing, but it's still not easy

78% of survey respondents said that Kubernetes is a "mature enterprise technology" today, and 70% say their organizations are mature in how they manage Kubernetes. 

But organizations say they experience more challenges managing K8s than they did last year, and they're more than twice as likely to be "regularly suffering issues" with the running of their clusters.

Is that really what we should expect from a "mature" technology?

4. Choice has a dark side

We all love the vibrant cloud-native ecosystem that's built up around Kubernetes — but professionals tell us that their number-one challenge is choosing the right software components from that ecosystem.

It's not just a question of too much choice: products get canceled and vendors go bust, leaving users trapped. 55% say they already feel "locked in" and more than half are worried about vendors they use shutting down.

The upshot? A massive 82% of senior decision-makers say the cloud-native ecosystem is poised for market consolidation.

5. Automation is the key to cost control

According to our research, nearly two-thirds of businesses say:

■ Their Kubernetes TCO has grown in the past year

■ They are facing more cost pressure than they did a year ago

■ They lack visibility into what their costs will be in the future.

In response, around a quarter say they actually expect to shrink their Kubernetes estates in the next year.

They're investigating a host of efficiency strategies, too. Top of the list? Automation, finops tools, autoscaling, and AI cost optimization tools.

More organizations than ever are turning to commercial Kubernetes management platforms to manage their clusters effectively, instead of relying on DIY tooling or cloud dashboards.

If you want an analyst's recommendation about the right K8s management platform, you might want to check out this report.

6. Platform engineering is real, but it's not everywhere yet

Platform engineering is the hottest IT management trend — but that doesn't mean everyone is doing it.

In our survey, 29% strongly agreed that they have ‘fully adopted' platform engineering roles and practices — 41% "somewhat" agreed.

There's evidence that platform engineering investments pay dividends. We found those that have fully adopted it were less likely to suffer issues with the running of their Kubernetes clusters.

But some are still skeptical about plateng, like this director of cloud: "I don't know if it's just another buzzword that we seem to create in engineering all the time. The engineering roles have not changed, right? They're still doing the same type of job."

7. AI, K8s and the edge are a match made in heaven

The explosion of interest in AI is causing a surge in Kubernetes interest.

More than two-thirds of organizations said that Kubernetes infrastructure is "key" to their company taking full advantage of AI in application workloads.

As one CTO put it, "Just given the capabilities that exist with Kubernetes, and the company's desire to consume more AI tools, we will use Kubernetes more in future."

Edge computing is a natural fit for AI workloads, taking models closer to the user and the source of data. Our respondents agreed: 68% said that the popularity of AI is driving interest in edge computing.

In fact, three quarters of those running K8s at the edge say they're already using AI at the edge!

8. Edge matures, but the challenges haven't gone away

27% of those using K8s at the edge say they have full-scale production deployments, up nearly 4x year on year.

But edge users cite the same fundamental challenges as in previous years: security first and foremost, but also issues relating to performing day 2 operations tasks and the cost of field engineering visits across multiple locations.

As one DevOps engineer said: "The biggest challenge for us is that nobody on site has any idea about the technology … we also have some use cases where [the edge locations] have no internet access."

9. Kubernetes is the key for VMware refugees

One of the biggest stories in IT this year has been Broadcom's takeover of VMware. In our survey, we can really see a switch has been flipped in IT buyers' minds.

Looking back, 74% said their K8s adoption has been inhibited by their use of traditional VMs.

Now, 59% say Broadcom's takeover has "accelerated cloud-native adoption," driven by a strategic effort to reduce VMware dependence.

It's not an overnight migration, but we see buyers exploring their options: 30% are investigating moving to bare metal, 43% are investigating shifting to less costly software vendors.

As one CTO put it: "[The acquisition of VMware] is influencing my decision making right now, heavily. We know we're not going to move completely away from virtualization immediately, but everything we can move into containerization, we probably will."

10. Despite the growing pains, adopters are confident

Kubernetes may be difficult and costly, with a host of concerns that even a decade of development hasn't managed to erase.

But it's still the best option for orchestrating workloads on modern infrastructure, with resilience, scalability and huge extensibility.

The vast majority of organizations we surveyed said that they are strategically committed to Kubernetes, and that they expected it to be a fundamental part of the IT infrastructure stack ten years from now.

Let's see, shall we?

To read the full findings from the report, click here.