What to choose for an on-prem platform - bare-metal or virtualized nodes? Of course there is one answer. It depends.

💡 I would choose virtualized nodes only when I already have an existing virtualization infrastructure and for small/medium size environments. It provides some additional flexibility. Allows provisioning of nodes via API, which is faster and simpler (provided it’s supported by Kubernetes/OpenShift provisioning software).
It can increase reliability by minimizing the impact of hardware failure.

💡 I would choose bare-metal nodes for larger environments. It doesn’t make sense to pay for virtualization software or introduce this abstraction layer when your software runs in ephemeral containers.
This mode requires more expertise in node provisioning, but it’s worth the time investment when there are hundreds of nodes. Did I mention that they can be quite cheap too, as they are ephemeral too and are easily replaceable?

🤔 How about your case? Do you really need a virtualization layer for your platform? What are you running, and why? I’m curious to hear your thoughts.
If you’re weighing the pros and cons of bare-metal vs. virtualized nodes for your platform and want to explore the best fit for your specific situation, I’m happy to share some insights.