Containers and images have become industry standards for software packaging and delivery. Kubernetes has become a standard platform for building, developing, and managing containerized cloud-native applications. An increasing number of enterprises and customers choose to deploy their applications in Container Service for Kubernetes (ACK). ACK supports the containerd, Docker, and Sandboxed-Container runtimes. This topic compares these runtimes in terms of implementations, limits, and deployment architectures. It also compares the commonly used commands provided by Docker Engine and containerd. This allows you to select a container runtime based on your requirements and scenarios.

Comparison in terms of implementations and limits

Item containerd Docker Sandboxed-Container Description
Cluster type Managed Kubernetes clusters, dedicated Kubernetes clusters and managed edge Kubernetes clusters All types Managed Kubernetes clusters and dedicated Kubernetes clusters None
Node type Supports:
  • ECS
  • EBM
  • User-owned nodes (Managed edge Kubernetes cluster)
 Supports:
  • ECS
  • EBM
 Supports:
  • EBM
 None
Node OS Supports:
  • CentOS
  • Alibaba Cloud Linux 2
  • ACK v1.20.4 version of Windows (Managed edge Kubernetes cluster)
 Supports:
  • CentOS
  • Alibaba Cloud Linux 2
  • Windows
 Supports:
  • Alibaba Cloud Linux 2 Customized Edition
  • You cannot deploy both Docker and Sandboxed-Container on a node.
  • To deploy both Docker and Sandboxed-Container in a cluster, you can create node pools of different runtime types.
Container engine containerd Docker Engine containerd None
Monitoring Supported Supported Supported None
Container log collection Supported Supported Supports log collection by using sidecar containers. Manual configuration is required. For more information about sidecar configurations, see Use CRDs to collect container text logs in Sidecar mode.
Container stdout collection Supported Supported Supported None
RuntimeClass Not supported Not supported Supported (runV) None
Pod scheduling No configuration is required. No configuration is required. You must add configurations based on the following rules:
  • For Kubernetes 1.14.x, you must add the following configuration to the nodeSelector field.
    alibabacloud.com/sandboxed-container: Sandboxed-Container.runv
  • For Kubernetes V1.16.x and later, no extra configuration is required.
 None
HostNetwork Supported Supported Not supported None
exec/logs Supported Supported Supported None
Node data disk Optional Optional Required. The data disk must be at least 200 GiB. None
Network plug-in Supports:
  • Flannel
  • Terway (Excluding managed edge Kubernetes cluster)
 Supports:
  • Flannel
  • Terway
 Supports:
  • Flannel
  • Terway: supports only the inclusive ENI mode.
 None
kube-proxy mode Supports:
  • Iptables
  • IPVS
 Supports:
  • Iptables
  • IPVS
 Supports:
  • Iptables
  • IPVS
 None
Volume plug-in CSI (Excluding managed edge Kubernetes cluster) CSI CSI None
Container root file system OverlayFS OverlayFS DeviceMapper None

Comparison in terms of deployment architectures

Runtime Deployment architecture
Docker 
kubelet -> dockerd -> containerd -> containerd-shim -> runC containers
Containerd 
kubelet -> containerd -> containerd-shim -> runC containers
Sandboxed-Container V2 
kubelet -> (CRI)containerd
                          \-> containerd-shim -> runC containers
                          \-> containerd-shim-rund-v2 -> runV sandboxed containers

Comparison of the commonly used commands provided by Docker Engine and containerd

Docker uses Docker Engine for container lifecycle management. Sandboxed-Container uses containerd for container lifecycle management. These tools provide different commands that can be used to manage images and containers. The following table describes the commonly used commands provided by Docker Engine and containerd.

Description Docker Containerd
docker crictl (recommended) ctr
Queries containers. docker ps crictl ps ctr -n k8s.io c ls
Queries information about one or more containers. docker inspect crictl inspect ctr -n k8s.io c info
Queries container logs. docker logs crictl logs N/A
Runs a command in a container. docker exec crictl exec N/A
Attaches to a container. docker attach crictl attach N/A
Queries resource usage statistics. docker stats crictl stats N/A
Creates a container. docker create crictl create ctr -n k8s.io c create
Starts one or more containers. docker start crictl start ctr -n k8s.io run
Stops one or more containers. docker stop crictl stop N/A
Removes one or more containers. docker rm crictl rm ctr -n k8s.io c del
Queries images. docker images crictl images ctr -n k8s.io i ls
Queries information about one or more images. docker inspect crictl inspecti N/A
Pulls an image. docker pull crictl pull ctr -n k8s.io i pull
Pushes an image. docker push N/A ctr -n k8s.io i push
Removes one or more images. docker rmi crictl rmi ctr -n k8s.io i rm
Queries pods. N/A crictl pods N/A
Queries information about one or more pods. N/A crictl inspectp N/A
Starts a new pod. N/A crictl runp N/A
Stops one or more pods N/A crictl stopp N/A