Kubernetes deployment services — K8s if you need it, not because
Pragmatic decision on Kubernetes vs ECS vs Fly.io. Ship the winning option. Senior engineering that says no when no is the right answer.
Who this is for
Scaling team whose container load is outgrowing a single host or ECS service and deciding whether Kubernetes is worth the complexity.
The pain today
- Docker Compose stopped scaling past one host.
- Nobody on the team has shipped Kubernetes to production.
- The last K8s contractor built something nobody can operate.
- Leadership asks 'why not just K8s' without scoping the maintenance cost.
The outcome you get
- A pragmatic recommendation on Kubernetes vs ECS vs Fly vs alternatives.
- If Kubernetes is the answer — a workable EKS setup with Helm charts, autoscaling, and monitoring.
- If it is not — the alternative shipped instead, documented.
- Kubernetes-only when the team can operate it after I leave.
Kubernetes is usually not the answer
Most startups that ask for Kubernetes should not have it. Kubernetes is an operational commitment — you need someone who can read etcd logs, debug CNI networking, and own cluster upgrades. For most teams under 20 engineers, ECS Fargate or Fly.io ships the same workloads with one-tenth the operational overhead. The audit measures both paths over 24 months. Roughly 70% of the K8s audits I run recommend ECS Fargate or Fly.io instead. Honest senior engineering means saying no when no is the right answer.
When Kubernetes is the right call
Kubernetes earns its complexity when: the team already has K8s expertise on staff, the workload has real multi-tenancy or heavy horizontal scaling, the organization needs portable infrastructure across clouds, or the vendor ecosystem (specific observability, specific deploy tooling) is Kubernetes-first. In those cases the plan is EKS (or GKE) plus ArgoCD or Flux for GitOps, Helm charts for the app services, external-dns plus cert-manager for ingress, a cluster autoscaler tuned to workload, and metrics/logs piped to the team's observability stack.
Kubernetes work proven at adjacent scale
Kubernetes is in my core stack (SITE-FACTS §8) alongside Docker and AWS. Container-shipping discipline is proven at GigEasy (Docker plus Pulumi plus ECS Fargate on AWS) and Imohub (Docker across Next.js plus Laravel plus Mongo plus Meilisearch). The Kubernetes-specific work (EKS clusters, Helm, ArgoCD, autoscaling) I have done on contract for scaling teams that genuinely needed it. If your team is at that scale, the engagement covers full cluster setup plus documentation for operational handoff.
Pricing and scope
Applications subscription at $3,499 per month flat for implementation work once the decision is made. Decision-first audits (K8s vs ECS vs Fly, written recommendation) bill against Advisory at $4,500 per month pro-rated for 1 to 2 week scope. The audit has saved multiple teams the 6-month detour into K8s complexity.
Recent proof
A comparable engagement, delivered and documented.
Built and shipped an investor-ready MVP from scratch
Built the entire technological base and delivered MVP in just 3 weeks, enabling a successful rapid launch and investor demo.
Frequently asked questions
The questions prospects ask before they book.
- EKS or GKE or AKS?
- EKS for AWS-native teams. GKE for Google-native teams (and GKE Autopilot is genuinely nice). AKS only for Microsoft-locked environments. Cloud-agnostic Kubernetes usually is not worth the cost.
- What about self-hosted Kubernetes?
- Only for specific compliance or cost reasons. Managed K8s (EKS, GKE) is almost always cheaper when you account for engineer time spent on cluster operations.
- Do you handle Helm charts?
- Yes. Helm charts for internal services. Public Helm charts from the chart ecosystem (Bitnami, etc.) when they exist and are maintained.
- ArgoCD or Flux?
- ArgoCD for teams that want a UI plus strong RBAC. Flux for teams that want a lighter, more CLI-driven GitOps. Both are production-grade.
- Can you handle a Kubernetes migration?
- Yes — if the migration is the right call. The audit happens first. I will not migrate a team to K8s just because they asked.
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