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As of 27 April 2020, Red Hat has decided to rename Red Hat OpenShift Container Engine to Red Hat OpenShift Kubernetes Engine to better communicate what value the product offering delivers.

Red Hat OpenShift Kubernetes Engine

Red Hat OpenShift Kubernetes Engine is a product offering from Red Hat that lets you use an enterprise class Kubernetes platform as a production platform for launching containers. You download and install OpenShift Kubernetes Engine the same way as OpenShift Container Platform as they are the same binary distribution, but OpenShift Kubernetes Engine offers a subset of the features that OpenShift Container Platform offers.

Similarities and differences

You can see the similarities and differences between OpenShift Kubernetes Engine and OpenShift Container Platform in the following table:

Table 1. Product comparison for OpenShift Kubernetes Engine and OpenShift Container Platform
OpenShift Kubernetes Engine OpenShift Container Platform

Fully Automated Installers

Yes

Yes

Over the Air Smart Upgrades

Yes

Yes

Enterprise Secured Kubernetes

Yes

Yes

Kubectl and oc automated command line

Yes

Yes

Operator Lifecycle Manager (OLM)

Yes

Yes

Administrator Web console

Yes

Yes

OpenShift Virtualization

Yes

Yes

User Workload Monitoring

Yes

Cluster Monitoring

Yes

Yes

Metering and Cost Management SaaS Service

Yes

Platform Logging

Yes

Yes

Developer Web Console

Yes

Developer Application Catalog

Yes

Source to Image and Builder Automation (Tekton)

Yes

OpenShift Service Mesh (Maistra, Kiali, and Jaeger)

Yes

OpenShift distributed tracing (Jaeger)

Yes

OpenShift Serverless (Knative)

Yes

OpenShift Pipelines (Jenkins and Tekton)

Yes

Embedded Component of IBM Cloud Pak and RHT MW Bundles

Yes

OpenShift sandboxed containers

Yes

Core Kubernetes and container orchestration

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine offers full access to an enterprise-ready Kubernetes environment that is easy to install and offers an extensive compatibility test matrix with many of the software elements that you might use in your data center.

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine offers the same service level agreements, bug fixes, and common vulnerabilities and errors protection as OpenShift Container Platform. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine includes a Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Virtual Datacenter and Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) entitlement that allows you to use an integrated Linux operating system with container runtime from the same technology provider.

The OpenShift Kubernetes Engine subscription is compatible with the Red Hat OpenShift support for Windows Containers subscription.

Enterprise-ready configurations

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine uses the same security options and default settings as the OpenShift Container Platform. Default security context constraints, pod security policies, best practice network and storage settings, service account configuration, SELinux integration, HAproxy edge routing configuration, and all other standard protections that OpenShift Container Platform offers are available in OpenShift Kubernetes Engine. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine offers full access to the integrated monitoring solution that OpenShift Container Platform uses, which is based on Prometheus and offers deep coverage and alerting for common Kubernetes issues.

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine uses the same installation and upgrade automation as OpenShift Container Platform.

Standard infrastructure services

With an OpenShift Kubernetes Engine subscription, you receive support for all storage plugins that OpenShift Container Platform supports.

In terms of networking, OpenShift Kubernetes Engine offers full and supported access to the Kubernetes Container Network Interface (CNI) and therefore allows you to use any third-party SDN that supports OpenShift Container Platform. It also allows you to use the included Open vSwitch software defined network to its fullest extent. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine allows you to take full advantage of the OVN Kubernetes overlay, Multus, and Multus plugins that are supported on OpenShift Container Platform. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine allows customers to use a Kubernetes Network Policy to create microsegmentation between deployed application services on the cluster.

You can also use the Route API objects that are found in OpenShift Container Platform, including its sophisticated integration with the HAproxy edge routing layer as an out of the box Kubernetes Ingress Controller.

Core user experience

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine users have full access to Kubernetes Operators, pod deployment strategies, Helm, and OpenShift Container Platform templates. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine users can use both the oc and kubectl command line interfaces. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine also offers an administrator web-based console that shows all aspects of the deployed container services and offers a container-as-a service experience. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine grants access to the Operator Life Cycle Manager that helps you control access to content on the cluster and life cycle operator-enabled services that you use. With an OpenShift Kubernetes Engine subscription, you receive access to the Kubernetes namespace, the OpenShift Project API object, and cluster-level Prometheus monitoring metrics and events.

Maintained and curated content

With an OpenShift Kubernetes Engine subscription, you receive access to the OpenShift Container Platform content from the Red Hat Ecosystem Catalog and Red Hat Connect ISV marketplace. You can access all maintained and curated content that the OpenShift Container Platform eco-system offers.

OpenShift Data Foundation compatible

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine is compatible and supported with your purchase of OpenShift Data Foundation.

Red Hat Middleware compatible

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine is compatible and supported with individual Red Hat Middleware product solutions. Red Hat Middleware Bundles that include OpenShift embedded in them only contain OpenShift Container Platform.

OpenShift Serverless

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine does not include OpenShift Serverless support. Use OpenShift Container Platform for this support.

Quay Integration compatible

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine is compatible and supported with a Red Hat Quay purchase.

OpenShift Virtualization

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine includes support for the Red Hat product offerings derived from the kubevirt.io open source project.

Advanced cluster management

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine is compatible with your additional purchase of Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management (RHACM) for Kubernetes. An OpenShift Kubernetes Engine subscription does not offer a cluster-wide log aggregation solution or support Elasticsearch, Fluentd, or Kibana based logging solutions. Similarly, the chargeback features found in OpenShift Container Platform or the console.redhat.com Cost Management SaaS service are not supported with OpenShift Kubernetes Engine. Red Hat Service Mesh capabilities derived from the open source istio.io and kiali.io projects that offer OpenTracing observability for containerized services on OpenShift Container Platform are not supported in OpenShift Kubernetes Engine.

Advanced networking

The standard networking solutions in OpenShift Container Platform are supported with an OpenShift Kubernetes Engine subscription. OpenShift Container Platform’s Kubernetes CNI plugin for automation of multi-tenant network segmentation between OpenShift Container Platform projects is entitled for use with OpenShift Kubernetes Engine. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine offers all the granular control of the source IP addresses that are used by application services on the cluster. Those egress IP address controls are entitled for use with OpenShift Kubernetes Engine. OpenShift Container Platform offers ingress routing to on cluster services that use non-standard ports when no public cloud provider is in use via the VIP pods found in OpenShift Container Platform. That ingress solution is supported in OpenShift Kubernetes Engine. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine users are supported for the Kubernetes ingress control object, which offers integrations with public cloud providers. Red Hat Service Mesh, which is derived from the istio.io open source project, is not supported in OpenShift Kubernetes Engine. Also, the Kourier Ingress Controller found in OpenShift Serverless is not supported on OpenShift Kubernetes Engine.

OpenShift sandboxed containers

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine does not include OpenShift sandboxed containers. Use OpenShift Container Platform for this support.

Developer experience

With OpenShift Kubernetes Engine, the following capabilities are not supported:

  • The CodeReady developer experience utilities and tools, such as CodeReady Workspaces.

  • OpenShift Container Platform’s pipeline feature that integrates a streamlined, Kubernetes-enabled Jenkins and Tekton experience in the user’s project space.

  • The OpenShift Container Platform’s source-to-image feature, which allows you to easily deploy source code, dockerfiles, or container images across the cluster.

  • Build strategies, builder pods, or Tekton for end user container deployments.

  • The odo developer command line.

  • The developer persona in the OpenShift Container Platform web console.

Feature summary

The following table is a summary of the feature availability in OpenShift Kubernetes Engine and OpenShift Container Platform. Where applicable, it includes the name of the Operator that enables a feature.

Table 2. Features in OpenShift Kubernetes Engine and OpenShift Container Platform
Feature OpenShift Kubernetes Engine OpenShift Container Platform Operator name

Fully Automated Installers (IPI)

Included

Included

N/A

Customizable Installers (UPI)

Included

Included

N/A

Disconnected Installation

Included

Included

N/A

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) or Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS (RHCOS) entitlement

Included

Included

N/A

Existing RHEL manual attach to cluster (BYO)

Included

Included

N/A

CRIO Runtime

Included

Included

N/A

Over the Air Smart Upgrades and Operating System (RHCOS) Management

Included

Included

N/A

Enterprise Secured Kubernetes

Included

Included

N/A

Kubectl and oc automated command line

Included

Included

N/A

Auth Integrations, RBAC, SCC, Multi-Tenancy Admission Controller

Included

Included

N/A

Operator Lifecycle Manager (OLM)

Included

Included

N/A

Administrator web console

Included

Included

N/A

OpenShift Virtualization

Included

Included

OpenShift Virtualization Operator

Compliance Operator provided by Red Hat

Included

Included

Compliance Operator

File Integrity Operator

Included

Included

File Integrity Operator

Gatekeeper Operator

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Gatekeeper Operator

Klusterlet

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

N/A

Kube Descheduler Operator provided by Red Hat

Included

Included

Kube Descheduler Operator

Local Storage provided by Red Hat

Included

Included

Local Storage Operator

Node Feature Discovery provided by Red Hat

Included

Included

Node Feature Discovery Operator

Performance Add-on Operator

Included

Included

Performance Add-on Operator

PTP Operator provided by Red Hat

Included

Included

PTP Operator

Service Telemetry Operator provided by Red Hat

Included

Included

Service Telemetry Operator

SR-IOV Network Operator

Included

Included

SR-IOV Network Operator

Vertical Pod Autoscaler

Included

Included

Vertical Pod Autoscaler

Cluster Monitoring (Prometheus)

Included

Included

Cluster Monitoring

Device Manager (for example, GPU)

Included

Included

N/A

Log Forwarding (with fluentd)

Included

Included

Red Hat OpenShift Logging Operator (for log forwarding with fluentd)

Telemeter and Insights Connected Experience

Included

Included

N/A

Feature

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine

OpenShift Container Platform

Operator name

OpenShift Cloud Manager SaaS Service

Included

Included

N/A

OVS and OVN SDN

Included

Included

N/A

MetalLB

Included

Included

MetalLB Operator

HAProxy Ingress Controller

Included

Included

N/A

Red Hat OpenStack Platform (RHOSP) Kuryr Integration

Included

Included

N/A

Ingress Cluster-wide Firewall

Included

Included

N/A

Egress Pod and Namespace Granular Control

Included

Included

N/A

Ingress Non-Standard Ports

Included

Included

N/A

Multus and Available Multus Plug-ins

Included

Included

N/A

Network Policies

Included

Included

N/A

IPv6 Single and Dual Stack

Included

Included

N/A

CNI Plug-in ISV Compatibility

Included

Included

N/A

CSI Plug-in ISV Compatibility

Included

Included

N/A

RHT and IBM middleware à la carte purchases (not included in OpenShift Container Platform or OpenShift Kubernetes Engine)

Included

Included

N/A

ISV or Partner Operator and Container Compatibility (not included in OpenShift Container Platform or OpenShift Kubernetes Engine)

Included

Included

N/A

Embedded OperatorHub

Included

Included

N/A

Embedded Marketplace

Included

Included

N/A

Quay Compatibility (not included)

Included

Included

N/A

RHEL Software Collections and RHT SSO Common Service (included)

Included

Included

N/A

Embedded Registry

Included

Included

N/A

Helm

Included

Included

N/A

User Workload Monitoring

Not Included

Included

N/A

Metering and Cost Management SaaS Service

Not Included

Included

N/A

Platform Logging

Not Included

Included

Red Hat OpenShift Logging Operator

OpenShift Elasticsearch Operator provided by Red Hat

Not Included

Cannot be run standalone

N/A

Developer Web Console

Not Included

Included

N/A

Developer Application Catalog

Not Included

Included

N/A

Source to Image and Builder Automation (Tekton)

Not Included

Included

N/A

OpenShift Service Mesh

Not Included

Included

OpenShift Service Mesh Operator

Service Binding Operator

Not Included

Included

Service Binding Operator

Feature

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine

OpenShift Container Platform

Operator name

Red Hat OpenShift Serverless

Not Included

Included

OpenShift Serverless Operator

Web Terminal provided by Red Hat

Not Included

Included

Web Terminal Operator

Red Hat OpenShift Pipelines Operator

Not Included

Included

OpenShift Pipelines Operator

Embedded Component of IBM Cloud Pak and RHT MW Bundles

Not Included

Included

N/A

Red Hat OpenShift GitOps

Not Included

Included

OpenShift GitOps

Red Hat CodeReady Workspaces

Not Included

Included

CodeReady Workspaces

Red Hat CodeReady Containers

Not Included

Included

N/A

Quay Bridge Operator provided by Red Hat

Not Included

Included

Quay Bridge Operator

Quay Container Security provided by Red Hat

Not Included

Included

Quay Operator

Red Hat OpenShift distributed tracing platform

Not Included

Included

Red Hat OpenShift distributed tracing platform Operator

Red Hat OpenShift Kiali

Not Included

Included

Kiali Operator

Metering provided by Red Hat (deprecated)

Not Included

Included

N/A

Migration Toolkit for Containers Operator

Not Included

Included

Migration Toolkit for Containers Operator

Cost management for OpenShift

Not included

Included

N/A

Red Hat JBoss Web Server

Not included

Included

JWS Operator

Red Hat Build of Quarkus

Not included

Included

N/A

Kourier Ingress Controller

Not included

Included

N/A

RHT Middleware Bundles Sub Compatibility (not included in OpenShift Container Platform)

Not included

Included

N/A

IBM Cloud Pak Sub Compatibility (not included in OpenShift Container Platform)

Not included

Included

N/A

OpenShift Do (odo)

Not included

Included

N/A

Source to Image and Tekton Builders

Not included

Included

N/A

OpenShift Serverless FaaS

Not included

Included

N/A

IDE Integrations

Not included

Included

N/A

OpenShift sandboxed containers

Not included

Not included

OpenShift sandboxed containers Operator

Windows Machine Config Operator

Community Windows Machine Config Operator included - no subscription required

Red Hat Windows Machine Config Operator included - Requires separate subscription

Windows Machine Config Operator

Red Hat Quay

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Quay Operator

Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes

Red Hat Advanced Cluster Security

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

N/A

OpenShift Data Foundation

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

OpenShift Data Foundation

Feature

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine

OpenShift Container Platform

Operator name

Ansible Automation Platform Resource Operator

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Ansible Automation Platform Resource Operator

Business Automation provided by Red Hat

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Business Automation Operator

Data Grid provided by Red Hat

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Data Grid Operator

Red Hat Integration provided by Red Hat

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Red Hat Integration Operator

Red Hat Integration - 3Scale provided by Red Hat

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

3scale

Red Hat Integration - 3Scale APICast gateway provided by Red Hat

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

3scale APIcast

Red Hat Integration - AMQ Broker

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

AMQ Broker

Red Hat Integration - AMQ Broker LTS

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Red Hat Integration - AMQ Interconnect

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

AMQ Interconnect

Red Hat Integration - AMQ Online

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Red Hat Integration - AMQ Streams

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

AMQ Streams

Red Hat Integration - Camel K

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Camel K

Red Hat Integration - Fuse Console

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Fuse Console

Red Hat Integration - Fuse Online

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Fuse Online

Red Hat Integration - Service Registry Operator

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Service Registry

API Designer provided by Red Hat

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

API Designer

JBoss EAP provided by Red Hat

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

JBoss EAP

JBoss Web Server provided by Red Hat

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

JBoss Web Server

Smart Gateway Operator

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Not Included - Requires separate subscription

Smart Gateway Operator

Kubernetes NMState Operator

Included

Included

N/A

Subscription limitations

OpenShift Kubernetes Engine is a subscription offering that provides OpenShift Container Platform with a limited set of supported features at a lower list price. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine and OpenShift Container Platform are the same product and, therefore, all software and features are delivered in both. There is only one download, OpenShift Container Platform. OpenShift Kubernetes Engine uses the OpenShift Container Platform documentation and support services and bug errata for this reason.