Cloud Agnostic vs Cloud Native: Developing a Hybrid Approach

Originally published by New Context.

It isn’t easy to compare and contrast cloud native vs. cloud agnostic because they’re not competing principles. In most cases, they work together to provide independence and flexibility to organizations. Cloud native is more of a philosophy that drives resilience and scalability. Meanwhile, cloud agnosticism centers on eliminating dependence upon any single provider.

As that’s the case, it’s not unusual to see them teamed together. This combination helps companies enjoy the benefits of both while closing any of the issues that they might create. Of course, in an environment that takes advantage of both, companies need to change their culture and systems management to support them.

Defining Cloud Agnostic vs. Cloud Native

While it’s unnecessary to choose between cloud agnostic vs. cloud native for most systems, they’re sometimes impractical based on access, availability, and resource limitations. In some cases, they may not even be an option.

Both cloud native and cloud agnostic offer significant benefits to companies, but they also come with some drawbacks. On the upside, they’re complementary processes that can support each other.

The Benefits and Risks of Using Both

The most significant benefit of using cloud native and cloud agnostic together is that the pros of each cancel out their counterpart’s cons. For example, one drawback of cloud native is that applications aren’t always portable. The portability of a cloud agnostic system can help to close that gap. Meanwhile, the wide berth of features available in a cloud agnostic environment means that a company will have more flexibility in its cloud native tool development. They can customize these tools based on specific needs and scale them for the fluctuations of their business.

There are some challenges found in an environment where both cloud native and agnostic work together. This issue is specific to the logging, monitoring, and management of systems. Agnosticism creates piecemealed programs that run independently of each other. While this is great for customizability, it’s a challenge in orchestration. It’s vital to find a way to bring these programs together and establish a single command center to monitor abnormal behaviors and issues.

Also, it’s not always financially feasible to go entirely cloud agnostic. A company may realize significant cloud computing cost savings when they stay with the same provider for all of their needs. As long as the benefits outweigh the risks, there is no major problem in taking this path.

Comparing cloud agnostic vs. cloud native doesn’t require choosing one over the other. They can be instrumental to success in a combined environment as they balance out each other’s limitations. However, the update to both represents a significant culture and systemic risk for businesses. Working with an expert capable of understanding the limits of a system helps companies develop a customized program that works seamlessly and maximizes efficiency across the board.