Docker vs Podman in 2026 - which container runtime should I choose for production?

We switched from Docker to Podman about a year ago in production and here is our experience:

Pros: Rootless containers by default is a huge security win. No daemon means no single point of failure. The Docker CLI compatibility is nearly 100% - we barely changed any scripts. Podman-compose works well for development.

Cons: Some CI/CD tools still have better Docker integration. A few edge cases with volume mounts behave differently. The ecosystem of GUI tools is smaller.

For Kubernetes compatibility, both work equally well since K8s uses containerd or CRI-O underneath anyway. I would recommend Podman for new projects, especially if security is a priority.

I would say it depends on your team experience and existing tooling:

Docker still has the larger ecosystem, better documentation, and Docker Desktop provides a smoother developer experience on macOS and Windows. Docker Scout for vulnerability scanning is also quite mature.

If you are running Linux servers and your team is comfortable with the CLI, Podman is the better choice. The daemonless architecture means better resource utilization and the systemd integration is excellent for managing container lifecycles.

One thing to consider: Docker now supports rootless mode too, so the security gap has narrowed significantly.

Our team is setting up a new microservices infrastructure and we are debating between Docker and Podman as our container runtime. We have used Docker extensively in the past but have heard good things about Podman, especially regarding security.

Our main concerns are: rootless container support, Kubernetes compatibility, CI/CD integration, and overall ecosystem maturity. We plan to run about 40 microservices.

Has anyone made the switch from Docker to Podman in production? What were the challenges and benefits you experienced?