Rancher Desktop : Kubernetes on local desktop

I loved using Docker Desktop, however a few months ago, I picked up Rancher Desktop. After using it for almost 3 months now, here are some quick insights I got from this tool.

• Rancher Desktop is a very mature open-source tool for Mac, Windows and Linux users who are looking for an alternative to Docker Desktop. It provided me everything I needed which was available in Docker Desktop.

• Allowed me to run any/multiple versions of Kubernetes and container management on my laptop.

• Provided me an option to build, push, pull, and run container images using dockerd (uses Moby internally).

• I could also run the containers that I built directly on Kubernetes without a need for the container registry.

Rancher Desktop leverages a virtual machine to run dockerd and Kubernetes.

I have not tried the windows version however the document says that Windows Subsystem for Linux v2 is leveraged for Windows systems.

It uses Kubernetes k3s also referred to as Lightweight Kubernetes.

Just download the run the Rancher Desktop to get started.

For more details on how to use Rancher Desktop refer to https://rancherdesktop.io/