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Apache Kafka vs Redpanda comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
6.3
Apache Kafka offers ROI through scalability, cost reduction, time savings, customization, and valuable insights, despite some challenges.
Sentiment score
3.5
Users experience high ROI from Redpanda due to cost savings, operational efficiency, easy setup, and enhanced investment experience.
I have seen a return on investment and personal gains since I started using Redpanda.
Senior Software Engineer at Prestatech
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.0
Apache Kafka primarily depends on an active open-source community for support, complemented by in-house expertise and optional paid services.
Sentiment score
4.9
Redpanda's customer service is valued for its knowledgeable support, useful community, and helpful resources during onboarding processes.
The Apache community provides support for the open-source version.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
There is plenty of community support available online.
With Microsoft, expectations are higher because we pay for a license and have a contract.
Senior Manager at Timestamp, SA
Redpanda has really amazing customer support based on my experience and from what I have read.
Senior Software Engineer at Prestatech
Not the technical support as in the usual way, but the community and the development support was great.
Software Engineer
The AWS team is also supporting us at any point.
SDE-2 at a tech vendor with 1-10 employees
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
Apache Kafka offers scalable solutions with Kubernetes, efficiently handling large data and users across industries, especially finance.
Sentiment score
6.6
Redpanda is highly scalable, praised for efficient storage and container compatibility, with minor concerns about data retention and complexity.
Customers have not faced issues with user growth or data streaming needs.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
Apache Kafka is highly scalable and supports horizontal scaling by allowing you to add more brokers to the cluster and increase the number of partitions for a topic.
Senior Engineer at Airy Software Technologies Private Limited
I need to enable my solution with high availability and scalability.
Data Architect at Ascendion
I would rate it ten out of ten for scalability.
Co Founder & CEO at SaYukth Private Limited
We never scaled horizontally by adding one machine, then two machines, then three machines, and so forth.
Software Analyst at CLSA
It is properly scalable and you can simply put it on a Kubernetes Pod or Docker Swarm and scale horizontally or vertically.
CTO at a tech services company with 1-10 employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.6
Apache Kafka is stable and reliable, efficiently handling high data volumes with minimal issues and high user satisfaction.
Sentiment score
8.5
Redpanda is considered highly stable by users, effectively handling workloads with high reliability, consistency, and minimal issues.
Apache Kafka is stable.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
This feature of Apache Kafka has helped enhance our system stability when handling high volume data.
DevOps Engineer
Apache Kafka is more stable and is very good technology for asynchronous programming.
Senior Engineer at Airy Software Technologies Private Limited
Redpanda is very stable.
SDE-2 at a tech vendor with 1-10 employees
I do not know about systems with ten thousand microservices and how they would react in that situation, but in our system where the latency and the throughput were way more important with less amount of things integrated with Redpanda, it was fine.
Software Engineer
I would rate it around eight or nine.
Software Analyst at CLSA
 

Room For Improvement

Kafka needs improvements in duplicate management, UI, troubleshooting, cloud integration, messaging control, ZooKeeper dependency, and management tools.
Redpanda requires better documentation, clustering, hardware support, and improved tools for integration, debugging, and connector options.
Operating an Apache Kafka cluster requires expertise in partitioning, application monitoring, and capacity planning.
Senior Engineer at Airy Software Technologies Private Limited
The performance angle is critical, and while it works in milliseconds, the goal is to move towards microseconds.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
Apache Kafka groups could introduce themes or profiles of configuration to help manage this complexity without needing expertise.
Senior Principal Architect at a computer software company with 501-1,000 employees
It needs better modern hardware with a better CPU, not just a normal CPU. A server-grade CPU is required.
Co Founder & CEO at SaYukth Private Limited
The biggest scalability improvement could be the retention.
Data Engineer at Datacrop
I think for the connectors, they are still young, so they need to enhance the connectors with anything such as MongoDB, cloud, big data, Elasticsearch, Datadog, Splunk, MySQL, databases, SGBDR, flat file, anything.
Middleware Tech Lead at MQnovaTool
 

Setup Cost

Apache Kafka is open-source and affordable, but managed services and support can incur additional costs.
Redpanda provides a cost-effective alternative to Kafka, offering free versions and straightforward setup, with paid support options.
From a price perspective, if you are asking about Apache Kafka, I would rate it a nine.
Senior Principal Architect at a computer software company with 501-1,000 employees
The open-source version of Apache Kafka results in minimal costs, mainly linked to accessing documentation and limited support.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
Apache Kafka itself is open source and free to use.
Senior Engineer at Airy Software Technologies Private Limited
In terms of pricing, Redpanda is free.
Co Founder & CEO at SaYukth Private Limited
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Redpanda is that it is straightforward with fast deployment.
CTO at a tech services company with 1-10 employees
 

Valuable Features

Apache Kafka provides scalable, fault-tolerant, real-time data streaming for reliable message processing and integration across platforms with open-source flexibility.
Redpanda provides high performance and Kafka compatibility with low resource consumption, benefiting developers with efficient scaling and configuration.
Apache Kafka is effective when dealing with large volumes of data flowing at high speeds, requiring real-time processing.
Apache Kafka is particularly valuable for managing high levels of transactions.
Senior Manager at Timestamp, SA
The best features include high throughput with low latency and support for horizontal scaling.
Senior Engineer at Airy Software Technologies Private Limited
Redpanda has positively impacted my organization by allowing us to move from a batch approach to a more streaming approach for our jobs, which cuts down on our delivery time and allows us to better meet our SLAs for our clients.
Senior Data Engineer at a tech vendor with 11-50 employees
This is excellent for streaming data and it is faster than most alternatives, and without JVM, which is beneficial.
CTO at a tech services company with 1-10 employees
The command-line interface and the UI have made my work easier by allowing me to deal with topics or with configurations really easily, issuing commands.
Senior Software Engineer at Prestatech
 

Categories and Ranking

Apache Kafka
Ranking in Streaming Analytics
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
92
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Redpanda
Ranking in Streaming Analytics
5th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Streaming Analytics category, the mindshare of Apache Kafka is 3.8%, up from 3.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Redpanda is 2.0%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Streaming Analytics Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Apache Kafka3.8%
Redpanda2.0%
Other94.2%
Streaming Analytics
 

Featured Reviews

Amandeep Pawar - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Engineer at Airy Software Technologies Private Limited
Event-driven architecture has improved asynchronous communication and supports high throughput
We can improve the high throughput because there are some limitations. We could add something to improve Apache Kafka. Based on my daily usage and analysis, there is a complex setup and management, which is one area requiring improvement. Apache Kafka does not have built-in message delay or scheduling capabilities. Apache Kafka cannot natively schedule messages. Limited message prioritization is also an area requiring improvement. Ordering is limited to a single partition. Large messages affect performance. Apache Kafka is optimized for many small to medium-sized messages, but large payloads increase network usage, increase disk usage, and slow down producers and consumers. I rate Apache Kafka eight out of ten instead of ten out of ten because operating an Apache Kafka cluster requires expertise in partitioning, application monitoring, and capacity planning. Self-managed deployment can become complex as the cluster grows. Pro-managed Apache Kafka services significantly reduce the operational overhead.
ArpitShah - PeerSpot reviewer
Software Analyst at CLSA
Event streaming has simplified video data cleanup and now powers real-time analytics
One area for improvement is providing more examples. For instance, Redpanda could be more useful as a sink where you get the data and can directly push to S3. While this is possible through the API, there are better and faster ways to do it. You can make a million API calls and accomplish the task in one and a half hours, but the same thing can be done in ten minutes through other methods. These faster approaches are not documented in obvious places. You have to find information scattered across various blogs. Redpanda should collect all the good blogs and best practices and put them in their documentation. This is more about knowledge management and making it easy for users to understand the product for complex use cases. For simple use cases, it is straightforward. We all use the basic pipe functionality. However, providing more examples would be useful. For example, integration with AWS and the AWS ecosystem would be cool.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Outsourcing Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Construction Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
21%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Educational Organization
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business33
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise51
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

What are the differences between Apache Kafka and IBM MQ?
Apache Kafka is open source and can be used for free. It has very good log management and has a way to store the data used for analytics. Apache Kafka is very good if you have a high number of user...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Apache Kafka?
From the AWS perspective, the price is on the higher side. However, if you go for Apache Kafka, it is low. From a price perspective, if you are asking about Apache Kafka, I would rate it a nine.
What needs improvement with Apache Kafka?
Apache Kafka is abundant with features which only an expert-level person will be able to manage due to the high volume and high concurrent expectations. Apache Kafka groups could introduce themes o...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Redpanda?
Regarding my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Redpanda, I am exploring the product. If I am convinced about the product and the capabilities, and I am sure I will be because I...
What needs improvement with Redpanda?
Redpanda can be improved in several ways, and the more I experiment with the product, the more limitations I find. I understand that this is about business, and the product should grow, and they ha...
What is your primary use case for Redpanda?
My main use case for Redpanda is primarily for streaming, and I am currently focusing on building data lakehouses because I find them really interesting. Redpanda fits into my data lakehouse setup ...
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Uber, Netflix, Activision, Spotify, Slack, Pinterest
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Apache Kafka vs. Redpanda and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.