Portainer vs Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform comparison

Portainer and Red Hat are both solutions in the Container Management category. Portainer is ranked #14 with an average rating of 8.0, while Red Hat is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.3. Portainer holds a 5.1% mindshare in CM, compared to Red Hat’s 22.1% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Portainer users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 96% of Red Hat users who would recommend it.

Portainer

Read 1 Portainer review

1,026 Views
910 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Red Hat OpenShift Container...

Read 49 Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform reviews

7,540 Views
6,251 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

Portainer

Red Hat OpenShift Container...

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Portainer and Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Red Hat, Amazon Web Services (AWS), VMware and others in Container Management.

To learn more, read our detailed Container Management Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Container Management

April 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 850,671 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Portainer

Ranking in Container Management

14th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Red Hat OpenShift Container...

Ranking in Container Management

1st

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Container Management category, the mindshare of Portainer is 5.1%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform is 22.1%, up from 20.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Container Management

Featured Reviews

Elio-Bonazzi

Developer with 1-10 employees

A GUI solution that helps to administer a docker using a browser

The first time using Portainer involves a learning curve. It takes longer as you're unfamiliar with the processes and might be lazy to consult the manual. Initially, you may rely on intuition within the GUI. However, after repeating the same tasks three or four times, the process becomes much quicker.

Read full review

Vlado Velkovski

DevOps Architect at KIBS

Provides automation that speeds up our process by 30% and helps us achieve zero downtime

OpenShift has a pretty steep learning curve. It's not an easy tool to use. It's not only OpenShift but Kubernetes itself. The good thing is that Red Hat provides specific targeted training. There are five or six pieces of training where you can get certifications. The licenses for OpenShift are pretty expensive, so they could be cheaper because the competition isn't sleeping, and Red Hat must take that into account. There are a few versions of OpenShift. There is the normal OpenShift and an OpenShift Plus license. Red Hat could think of how to connect those two subscriptions because, with Red Hat Plus, you have one tool called ACM (Advanced Cluster Management), where you can manage multiple clusters from one place. We deployed this functionality by ourselves, but if you don't pay the license for Red Hat OpenShift Plus, you'll lack this functionality. If you have a multi-cloud environment and you have a lot of work to do, it would be a plus if the Red Had OpenShift Plus license came in a bundle with the regular solutions. This ACM tool should be available in the normal subscription, not just the Plus version. There are new versions on an almost weekly basis. I found myself that the upgrading of OpenShift clusters is not a task that will successfully finish every time. It's a simple and quick, but not reliable process. That's why we use multiple clusters. We use v4.10.3, but we want to move to v4.12.X. The upgrade process itself can fail, and we don't have backups of our OpenShift cluster because we have backups of all the Kubernetes manifests on GitHub. We destroy the cluster, bring up a new one quickly, and apply those scripts. The upgrade itself could be more resilient for us as administrators of OpenShift to be sure that it'll succeed and not occasionally fail. They can improve the reliability of their upgrade process. They also have implementations of some Red Hat-verified operators for a lot of products like Elasticsearch. They're good enough for development purposes, but some of the OpenShift operators still lack resilient production-grade configurations. Red Hat says that we have a few hundred operators, but I believe that only half of them are production-grade ready at this moment. They need to work much more on those operators to become more flexible because you can deploy all of them in development mode, but when we go to production grade and want to make specific changes to the operator and configuration, we lack those possibilities.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Portainer comes with the ability to take the information of docker definition. Using it, I can visually observe how the container has been created. It allows me to create networks. I can also visually generate volumes and working stacks."

"OpenShift is a user-friendly container platform with a solid GUI that helps you follow what is going on and gives you an overview of all your clusters. It's more user-friendly than the Kubernetes itself. The interface helps you learn the platform and provides access to some features or specific comments."

"I think it's a pretty scalable tool...The solution's technical support has been pretty good."

"The most valuable features of OpenShift include its advanced security, integrated DNS system, built-in pipeline management with Tekton, enhanced networking routes, and dedicated platforms for DataOps and MLOps."

"Integrating the product into our existing infrastructure was easy."

"The auto scalability feature, which is based on smart agendas, determined from pre-prepared rules is the most valuable feature. You can also create different routes for deployment. Deployment types can be provided with an identifier, such as an ARB deployment. This really helped in rolling out releases without disrupting services for the end-users."

"It is easy to expand."

"The operating system has a live update and is more secure than any other. It's made for Atomic OS, a lightweight OS new to the market. I also like the source-to-image capabilities. The customer can directly deploy their applications from the repository. It's a highly flexible and easy way to deploy into production."

"The initial setup process is easy."

More Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform pros

Cons

"Portainer needs to be more intuitive."

"OpenShift Container Platform needs to work on integrations."

"The stability needs improvement."

"We are not big customers of Red Hat, but sometimes, we have severe bugs. We are very innovative, and sometimes, we have to wait for a long time to get proper attention. Red Hat should improve on that."

"The UI could be more user-friendly to drive tasks more effectively through the interface."

"There is room for improvement with integration."

"The solution needs to introduce open ID connect integration for role-based access control."

"The support costs are too high."

"I believe that the documentation part is an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required."

More Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available

"The pricing is a bit more expensive than expected."

"We paid for Cloud Pak for integration. It all depends on how many VMs or how many CPUs you are using. They do the licensing based on that."

"The pricing is expensive for licensing."

"The license to use the OpenShift Container Platform is free. If you are capable with Java you can modify it."

"It largely depends on how much money they earn from the application being deployed; you don't normally deploy an app just for the purpose of having it. You must constantly look into your revenue and how much you spend every container, minute, or hour of how much it is working."

"It depends on who you're talking to. For a large corporation, it is acceptable, other than the significant infrastructure requirements. For a small organization, it is in no way suitable, and we'd go for Amazon's container solution."

"If you buy the product for a year or three, you get a lot of discounts...I feel that the product is worth its cost, especially since setting it up can be done with just a few clicks."

"I'm an architect, so I have no involvement in the pricing and licensing of the platform."

More Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Container Management solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

850,671 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Comms Service Provider

10%

University

Energy/Utilities Company

Financial Services Firm

22%

Computer Software Company

12%

Government

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Portainer?

Portainer comes with the ability to take the information of docker definition. Using it, I can visually observe how the container has been created. It allows me to create networks. I can also visua...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Portainer?

Portainer needs to be more intuitive.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Portainer?

The tool is a GUI that helps to administer a docker using a browser.

See all answers

Which is better - OpenShift Container Platform or VMware Tanzu Mission Control?

Red Hat Openshift is ideal for organizations using microservices and cloud environments. I like that the platform is auto-scalable, which saves overhead time for developers. I think Openshift can b...

See all answers

What do you like most about OpenShift Container Platform?

The tool's most valuable features include high availability, scalability, and security. Other features like advanced cluster management, advanced cluster security, and Red Hat Quay make it powerful...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for OpenShift Container Platform?

OpenShift pricing varies by region. For example, a simple cluster with three nodes in DAL-10 might cost around $560 to $580 per month, subject to specific configurations like memory and CPU cores.

See all answers

Comparisons

Komodor vs Portainer

Compared 60% of the time

Kubernetes vs Portainer

Compared 10% of the time

HashiCorp Nomad vs Portainer

Compared 7% of the time

Rancher Labs vs Portainer

Compared 6% of the time

Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE vs Portainer

Compared 4% of the time

More Portainer Competitors

Amazon EKS vs Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform

Compared 47% of the time

Nutanix Kubernetes Engine NKE vs Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform

Compared 16% of the time

VMware Tanzu Platform vs Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform

Compared 7% of the time

Nutanix Kubernetes Platform (NKP) vs Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform

Compared 5% of the time

Docker vs Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform

Compared 1% of the time

More Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Container Management

April 2025

Download Portainer product report

Buyer's Guide

Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform

April 2025

Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform report

Download Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform product report

Overview

Portainer offers a robust platform for managing Docker environments, streamlining containerized application deployments and simplifying complex processes. It provides scalability and efficiency for IT operations.

Portainer facilitates comprehensive management of containerized environments, increasing operational efficiency. Known for its intuitive interface and broad functionality, Portainer minimizes time spent on mundane management tasks. Users benefit from resource optimization and improved visibility in container orchestration. As organizations continue to embrace cloud-native technologies, Portainer becomes a reliable choice for those looking to harness the full potential of Docker while maintaining easy control and oversight of container workloads.

What key features does Portainer offer?

Container Management: Simplifies handling of Docker containers with an easy-to-use interface.
Application Templates: Provides pre-defined templates for faster deployment of applications.
Role-Based Access Control: Ensures secure access through detailed permission settings.
Support for Multi-Cluster: Allows managing multiple clusters from a single point.
Monitoring and Logging: Offers detailed insights and logging for efficient resource monitoring.

Which benefits should be expected from Portainer?

Time Savings: Reduces time spent on manual configurations with its streamlined processes.
Cost Efficiency: Maximizes resource utilization, potentially lowering operational costs.
Enhanced Security: Provides secure management of access and deployments.
Scalability: Supports growth with features that accommodate expanding infrastructures.

In industries like healthcare and finance, Portainer is deployed to manage sensitive data workflows, ensuring compliance and security. It's used in manufacturing for optimizing IoT integrations and in the tech industry to manage microservices efficiently, aligning with modern agile development practices.

Portainer

Red Hat® OpenShift® offers a consistent hybrid cloud foundation for building and scaling containerized applications. Benefit from streamlined platform installation and upgrades from one of the enterprise Kubernetes leaders.

Red Hat

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

Edenor, BMW, Ford, Argentine Ministry of Health

Find out what your peers are saying about Red Hat, Amazon Web Services (AWS), VMware and others in Container Management. Updated: April 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

850,671 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our list of best Container Management vendors.

We monitor all Container Management reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.