Installation options

Option 1: Single-host Docker setup

The single-host installation is a lightweight, easy-to-use option that is ideal for small to medium-sized environments. It involves running Instana on a single host with all the necessary components of the Instana platform as Docker containers.

The benefits of this installation method include its simplicity and quick setup, low resource requirements, and suitability for testing and development. However, this installation method has limited scalability, lacks redundancy, and offers limited high availability options.

For information about how to install the Instana back-end as a single-host setup on Docker, see Installing Instana backend on Docker.

Option 2: Dual-host Docker setup

The dual-host installation is designed for environments where ClickHouse is deployed on one host with a ZooKeeper installation. The rest of the Instana components and data stores are deployed on a second host.

This approach allows for better scalability of ClickHouse separately from the rest of Instana, based on requests per second (load). Resource allocation can be more efficient with separate hosts as more resources can be allocated independently to Instana and ClickHouse as they require more CPU or memory.

However, a dual-host setup is slightly more complex than a single-host setup, as two hosts need to be maintained and configured, requiring more infrastructure.

For information about how to create a Dual-host Instana setup on Docker, see Installation: Dual-host.

Option 3: Kubernetes cluster setup

The Kubernetes or Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform cluster installation is the most scalable and flexible option, where Instana is deployed on a Kubernetes cluster, providing a highly available and fault-tolerant infrastructure.

The benefits of this installation method include high scalability and flexibility, strong high-availability options, and ease of deployment and management. However, deploying a Kubernetes cluster requires more investment in infrastructure and Kubernetes management expertise.

For information about how to install the Instana back-end on a Kubernetes cluster, see Installing and configuring a self-hosted Instana backend on Kubernetes or Red Hat OpenShift (on-premises).