ServerlessAutomated, fully managed Kafka clusters with zero ops
Automated, fully managed Kafka clusters with zero ops
Automated, fully managed Kafka clusters with zero ops
A Complete Comparison of Apache Kafka vs Confluent
Used by over 70% of the Fortune 500, Apache Kafka has become the foundational platform for streaming data, but self-supporting the open source project puts you in the business of managing low-level data infrastructure. With Kafka at its core, Confluent offers complete, fully managed, cloud-native data streaming that's available everywhere your data and applications reside.
Here are the major differences between Confluent and Kafka, as well as a complete stackup of features - from connectors, security, and monitoring, to governance.
Unleash a cloud-native experience with a complete feature-set only available with Confluent
Confluent provides a truly cloud-native experience, completing Kafka with a holistic set of enterprise-grade features to unleash developer productivity, operate efficiently at scale, and meet all of your architectural requirements before moving to production. Underpinning the platform is our 99.99% uptime SLA and committer-driven expertise, providing support and services from the team with over one million hours of technical experience with Kafka.
Truly Cloud-native Design
| Apache Kafka | Confluent | |
|---|---|---|
Serverless | ||
Elastic ScalingScale up and down from 0 to GBps without over-provisioning infra Scale up and down from 0 to GBps without over-provisioning infra | ||
Infinite Storage / Tiered StorageCost-effectively retain data at any scale without growing compute Cost-effectively retain data at any scale without growing compute | ||
High AvailabilityGuaranteed 99.99% uptime SLA with built-in failover and multi-AZ replication Guaranteed 99.99% uptime SLA with built-in failover and multi-AZ replication | ||
No ZooKeeper managementMetadata management completely abstracted away Metadata management completely abstracted away | ||
No-touch patching and upgradesFully optimized infra with zero-downtime patching and upgrades Fully optimized infra with zero-downtime patching and upgrades |
Unrestricted Developer Productivity
| Apache Kafka | Confluent | |
|---|---|---|
Apache KafkaDistributed event streaming platform that's become de facto industry standard Distributed event streaming platform that's become de facto industry standard | ||
Kafka ConnectPluggable, declarative data integration framework Pluggable, declarative data integration framework | ||
Kafka StreamsClient library for stream processing Client library for stream processing | ||
Multi-language Development | ||
Java ClientsWrite producer / consumer apps with Java Write producer / consumer apps with Java | ||
Non-Java ClientsC/C++, Python, Go, .NET C/C++, Python, Go, .NET | ||
REST ProxyAccess Kafka from any network connected application Access Kafka from any network connected application | ||
MQTT ProxyAccess Kafka from MQTT devices & gateways Access Kafka from MQTT devices & gateways | ||
Stream Processing & Integration | ||
Connectors120+ expert-built and tested connectors 120+ expert-built and tested connectors | ||
FlinkSimple, serverless stream processing to effortlessly enrich, join and filter your data Simple, serverless stream processing to effortlessly enrich, join and filter your data | ||
Stream DesignerVisual canvas for rapidly building streaming data pipelines extensible with SQL Visual canvas for rapidly building streaming data pipelines extensible with SQL |
Efficient Operations at Scale
| Apache Kafka | Confluent | |
|---|---|---|
GUI-driven Management | ||
Cloud UI / Control CenterGUI to manage & monitor clusters at any scale GUI to manage & monitor clusters at any scale | ||
Intelligent Monitoring & Observability | ||
Metrics APIDiscover topic & cluster-level metrics, request metrics values, or post queries Discover topic & cluster-level metrics, request metrics values, or post queries | ||
Datadog / Prometheus IntegrationMonitor data streams directly alongside the rest of your technology stack Monitor data streams directly alongside the rest of your technology stack | ||
Health+Intelligent alerting & cloud-based monitoring to ensure cluster health Intelligent alerting & cloud-based monitoring to ensure cluster health | ||
Flexible DevOps Automation | ||
Admin REST APIsSimplify management via RESTful interface for performing admin ops Simplify management via RESTful interface for performing admin ops | ||
Confluent for KubernetesComplete, declarative API to deploy on Kubernetes Complete, declarative API to deploy on Kubernetes | ||
Ansible PlaybooksAutomate deployment on non-containerized environments Automate deployment on non-containerized environments | ||
Self-Balancing ClustersAutomated partition rebalancing to optimize performance Automated partition rebalancing to optimize performance |
Production-stage Prerequisites
| Apache Kafka | Confluent | |
|---|---|---|
Enterprise-grade Security | ||
Access Control ListsAuthorization controls for cluster data Authorization controls for cluster data | ||
Role-Based Access ControlGranular resource-level authorization of access across user groups Granular resource-level authorization of access across user groups | ||
Audit LogsStructured user action logs to detect security threats & anomalies Structured user action logs to detect security threats & anomalies | ||
Secret Protection / EncryptionEncrypt all data-at-rest and network traffic to clients with TLS 1.2 Encrypt all data-at-rest and network traffic to clients with TLS 1.2 | ||
Bring Your Own KeyEncrypt data-at-rest with your own custom key(s) Encrypt data-at-rest with your own custom key(s) | ||
Private NetworkingVPC/VNet peering, AWS Transit Gateway, AWS/Azure Private Link, GCP Private Service Connect VPC/VNet peering, AWS Transit Gateway, AWS/Azure Private Link, GCP Private Service Connect | ||
HIPAA/GDPR/CCPA readinessBuilt-in compliance including SOC 1/2/3 & ISO 27001, GDPR/CCPA readiness, and more Built-in compliance including SOC 1/2/3 & ISO 27001, GDPR/CCPA readiness, and more | ||
Data Governance | ||
Schema RegistryCentral registry to ensure data compatibility Central registry to ensure data compatibility | ||
Schema ValidationBroker-side schema validation & enforcement with topic-level granularity Broker-side schema validation & enforcement with topic-level granularity | ||
Stream CatalogSelf-service data discovery to search, classify, & organize your data streams Self-service data discovery to search, classify, & organize your data streams | ||
Stream LineageUnderstand data lineage with interactive, end-to-end mapping of your data streams Understand data lineage with interactive, end-to-end mapping of your data streams | ||
Stream SharingSimple and safe way to share streaming data across organizations Simple and safe way to share streaming data across organizations | ||
Global Resilience | ||
99.99% Uptime SLASafely run mission critical workloads with SLA covering both software & infrastructure Safely run mission critical workloads with SLA covering both software & infrastructure | ||
Cluster LinkingSeamlessly link clusters across any environment to build hybrid & multicloud architectures Seamlessly link clusters across any environment to build hybrid & multicloud architectures | ||
Multi-AZ / Multi-Region ClustersMinimize downtime by running across multiple availability zones or regions Minimize downtime by running across multiple availability zones or regions | ||
MirrorMaker 2Asynchronous replication based on Kafka Connect Asynchronous replication based on Kafka Connect | ||
ReplicatorExpert-built, supported, & battle-tested replication across clusters based on Kafka Connect Expert-built, supported, & battle-tested replication across clusters based on Kafka Connect |
Committer-driven Expertise
| Apache Kafka | Confluent | |
|---|---|---|
24x7x365 Expert SupportAccess to world's foremost Kafka experts with over 1 million hours of experience Access to world's foremost Kafka experts with over 1 million hours of experience | ||
Professional ServicesCustomized hands-on engagements to achieve your business outcomes in timely manner Customized hands-on engagements to achieve your business outcomes in timely manner | ||
EducationVariety of training offerings to build streaming expertise across your organization Variety of training offerings to build streaming expertise across your organization |
To truly tap into Kafka, you need Confluent
Cloud-native
Eliminate your ops burden with a truly cloud-native Kafka solution
While Kafka is a powerful distributed system, modern enterprises do not want to be in the business of supporting the open source distribution in-house. ZooKeeper needs to be managed, partitions rebalanced, failover and scaling processes designed — the list goes on. Confluent completely re-architected Kafka from the ground up to provide teams with a truly cloud-native experience that delivers an elastically scalable and globally available service ready to deploy, operate, and scale in a matter of minutes.
Complete
Accelerate time-to-value and reduce TCO with a complete data streaming platform
Kafka is a powerful platform, but it doesn’t offer everything you need out-of-the-box. With open source Kafka alone, you’re on the hook to build and maintain foundational tooling and infrastructure, such as connectors, data governance and security, disaster recovery capabilities, and more. And when ready to deploy, the platform creates a significant ongoing operational burden — one that only grows over time. Your business has better things to do. Confluent provides a holistic set of enterprise-grade capabilities designed to eliminate the need to spend costly dev cycles building and maintaining tools, helping customers save up to 60% in TCO and quickly realize value from their real-time use cases.
Everywhere
Seamlessly connect your data and applications everywhere they reside across hybrid and multicloud architectures
Kafka helps to streamline digital architectures in real time, avoid complex point-to-point integrations, and break data silos. To truly meet that goal though, you need a solution that spans all of your environments, both on-premises and across cloud providers. Confluent exists everywhere your applications and data reside, providing you the freedom to leverage a fully managed service on all leading public clouds and self-managed software you can deploy for on-premises workloads, whether on bare metal, VMs, or Kubernetes. Best of all, you can seamlessly connect it all together in real time with Cluster Linking to create a consistent data layer across your entire business.
"For me to go hire a bunch of engineers to babysit Kafka, I don’t have the ability to go do that. And being able to offload those concerns is just such a relief for us and lets us focus on delivering value to the organization and not worrying about ops and other overhead... Just things like spinning up Kafka clusters and getting prototypes up and running very quickly, Confluent has been really helpful there. Those sort of exercises might take a long time for my team to do if we were doing this on vanilla open source Kafka. With Confluent, we can turn that around very quickly."
Natt Kupp
Director of Engineering, Data
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Confluent Cloud
A fully managed, cloud-native service for Apache Kafka, available on AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud
Confluent Platform
A complete, enterprise-grade distribution of Apache Kafka for workloads in your on-prem and private cloud environments
Migrate from Kafka to Confluent
Your complete guide to migrate from open-source (OSS) Apache Kafka to Confluent. This includes best practices & customer success stories on personal migration journeys.