Audience
IT teams searching for a powerful Container Networking platform
About flannel
flannel is a virtual networking layer designed specifically for containers. OpenShift Container Platform can use it for networking containers instead of the default software-defined networking (SDN) components. This is useful if running OpenShift Container Platform within a cloud provider platform that also relies on SDN, such as OpenStack, and you want to avoid encapsulating packets twice through both platforms. Each flanneld agent provides this infomation to a centralized etcd store so other agents on hosts can route packets to other containers within the flannel network. The following diagram illustrates the architecture and data flow from one container to another using a flannel network.
Other Popular Alternatives & Related Software
IBM Cloud Red Hat Openshift
With Red Hat OpenShift on IBM Cloud, OpenShift developers have a fast and secure way to containerize and deploy enterprise workloads in Kubernetes clusters. Because IBM manages OpenShift Container Platform (OCP), you'll have more time to focus on your core tasks. Automated provisioning and configuration of infrastructure (compute, network and storage), installation and configuration of OpenShift. Automatic scaling, backups and failure recovery for OpenShift configurations, components and worker nodes. Automatic upgrades of all components (operating system, OpenShift components, cluster services) and performance tuning and security hardening. Built-in security including image signing, image deployment enforcement, hardware trust, security patch management, and automatic compliance (HIPAA, PCI, SOC2, ISO).
Learn more
Red Hat OpenShift Data Foundation
Red Hat® OpenShift® Data Foundation—previously Red Hat OpenShift Container Storage—is software-defined storage for containers. Engineered as the data and storage services platform for Red Hat OpenShift, Red Hat OpenShift Data Foundation helps teams develop and deploy applications quickly and efficiently across clouds. Developers—even those with limited storage expertise—can provision storage directly from Red Hat OpenShift without switching to a separate user interface. Format data as files, blocks, or objects to support all kinds of workloads created by enterprise Kubernetes users. Our technical experts can work with you to find an approach that meets your storage needs for hybrid cloud and multicloud container deployments.
Learn more
Project Calico
Calico is an open-source networking and network security solution for containers, virtual machines, and native host-based workloads. Calico supports a broad range of platforms including Kubernetes, OpenShift, Mirantis Kubernetes Engine (MKE), OpenStack, and bare metal services. Whether you opt to use Calico's eBPF data plane or Linux’s standard networking pipeline, Calico delivers blazing-fast performance with true cloud-native scalability. Calico provides developers and cluster operators with a consistent experience and set of capabilities whether running in the public cloud or on-prem, on a single node, or across a multi-thousand-node cluster. Calico gives you a choice of data planes, including a pure Linux eBPF data plane, a standard Linux networking data plane, and a Windows HNS data plane. Whether you prefer the cutting-edge features of eBPF or the familiarity of the standard primitives that existing system administrators already know, Calico has you covered.
Learn more
Calico Cloud
Pay-as-you-go security and observability SaaS platform for containers, Kubernetes, and cloud. Get a live view of dependencies and how all the services are communicating with each other in a multi-cluster, hybrid and multi-cloud environment. Eliminate setup and onboarding steps and troubleshoot your Kubernetes security and observability issues within minutes. Calico Cloud is a next-generation security and observability SaaS platform for containers, Kubernetes, and cloud. It enables organizations of all sizes to protect their cloud workloads and containers, detect threats, achieve continuous compliance, and troubleshoot service issues in real-time across multi-cluster, multi-cloud, and hybrid deployments. Calico Cloud is built on Calico Open Source, the most widely adopted container networking and security solution. Instead of managing a platform for container and Kubernetes security and observability, teams consume it as a managed service for faster analysis, relevant actions, etc.
Learn more
Integrations
Company Information
Red Hat
Founded: 1993
United States
docs.openshift.com/container-platform/3.4/architecture/additional_concepts/flannel.html
Videos and Screen Captures
Other Useful Business Software
Gemini 3 and 200+ AI Models on One Platform
Build generative AI apps with Vertex AI. Switch between models without switching platforms.
Product Details
Platforms Supported
Cloud
Training
Documentation
Support
Online
