Open tools, not proprietary pipelines
Northflank wraps your infrastructure in proprietary build pipelines and deployment abstractions. Skyhook enhances your clusters with open tools - ArgoCD for GitOps, Kyverno for policies, Helm for packaging - giving you the same developer experience without trading standard Kubernetes for a managed black box.
How Skyhook compares
| Dimension | Skyhook | Northflank |
|---|---|---|
| Core approach | Developer platform that layers on top of Kubernetes clusters running in your cloud account (AWS, GCP, Azure, OCI). You control the infrastructure while Skyhook provides the developer experience. | Managed platform that runs workloads in Northflank's cloud or provisions clusters on your behalf. Acts as a PaaS layer over Kubernetes. |
| Infrastructure ownership | Skyhook provisions clusters for you or connects to existing ones - EKS, GKE, AKS, OCI, on-prem, or bare metal. Your cloud account, your rules. Full kubectl access at all times. | Workloads run in Northflank's shared cloud by default. BYOC (bring your own cloud) available but Northflank still manages the cluster lifecycle. |
| Vendor lock-in | Standard Kubernetes resources only. No proprietary runtime, no custom abstractions. Leave anytime - your workloads are already vanilla K8s. | Proprietary deployment model and configuration. Leaving requires re-implementing CI/CD, networking, secrets management, and deployment workflows. |
| Pricing model | Generous free tier with 3 users, 3 services, and 1 cluster - no credit card required. No compute markup on top of your cloud bill. Paid tiers scale with your team. | Pay-per-resource consumption pricing. CPU at $0.01667/vCPU/hour, memory at $0.00833/GB/hour. Costs scale linearly with usage and can be hard to predict. |
| Developer experience | Service catalog, preview environments, canary and blue-green deployments, production readiness checks, and auto-scaling - all from a unified dashboard. | Git-connected deployments, preview environments, and build pipelines. Good DX for simple apps but limited rollout strategies. |
| GitOps & CI/CD | Built-in GitOps with ArgoCD. Works alongside your existing CI pipelines. Declarative, auditable deployments. | Built-in CI/CD with buildpack support. Replaces your existing pipeline rather than integrating with it. |
| Rollout strategies | Canary deployments with traffic splitting, blue-green with instant cutover, progressive delivery with auto-rollback on error thresholds. | Rolling updates and blue-green deployments. No native canary or progressive delivery with auto-rollback. |
| Production readiness | Automated production readiness framework that validates services against reliability, security, resilience, and performance checks before they ship. | No built-in production readiness scoring. Teams must build their own validation workflows. |
Feature-by-feature comparison
Why teams choose Skyhook over Northflank
Your cloud account, your control
Northflank runs your workloads on their managed infrastructure by default. With Skyhook, your code runs in your AWS, GCP, or Azure account. You have full kubectl access and complete visibility into your cloud infrastructure.
Predictable pricing
Northflank's per-resource billing means your costs scale with every vCPU-hour and GB-hour. Skyhook's free tier (3 users, 3 services, 1 cluster) lets you get started at no cost. You pay your cloud provider directly for compute - pair with their free credits and there's zero cost to try Skyhook with real workloads.
Advanced deployment strategies
Northflank supports rolling updates and blue-green deployments. Skyhook adds canary deployments with traffic splitting and progressive delivery with automatic rollback when error rates spike. Ship to production with precision.
No platform lock-in
Every resource Skyhook creates is standard Kubernetes. There's no proprietary runtime, no custom networking layer, no abstracted storage. If you ever decide to leave, your workloads are already running on vanilla K8s - there's literally nothing to migrate.
Frequently asked questions
I like that Northflank handles infrastructure for me. Why would I want to manage my own clusters?
Skyhook can provision clusters for you too - the difference is that the infrastructure runs in your cloud account. This means no compute markup, full visibility into your cluster, and the ability to customize anything at the Kubernetes level when you need to.
How does Skyhook's pricing compare to Northflank's pay-per-resource model?
Skyhook's free tier includes 3 users, 3 services, and 1 cluster - enough to run real workloads. You pay your cloud provider directly for compute, and most providers offer free credits for new accounts. With Northflank, you pay their per-hour rates on top of infrastructure costs, which can add up quickly as you scale.
Can I migrate from Northflank to Skyhook?
Yes. Skyhook can provision Kubernetes clusters for you, or you can connect existing ones. Your application code doesn't change - you just configure your services in Skyhook and point your Git repositories at it.
Does Skyhook support GPU workloads?
Skyhook works with any Kubernetes cluster, including those with GPU nodes. If your cloud provider supports GPU instances, you can run GPU workloads through Skyhook. However, we don't offer managed GPU instances like Northflank does.
Last updated: April 2026
Why Choose Skyhook?
Best Practices Out-of-the-Box
Start strong with monitoring, rollout strategies, ephemeral environments and secret management.
No Lock-in
Stay in control without being dependent on specific cloud providers or third-party tools. Unlike PaaS, you can easily migrate away.
Start and scale quickly
Get started in minutes, not days, with our fully configured environment. Grows with your needs, regardless of engineering group size.
Kubernetes based
Simplify Kubernetes for developers and make management easy for DevOps.
The Best tools
Skyhook has built-in support for the top tools in the Kubernetes ecosystem, such as ArgoCD, Kyverno, Grafana and many more.
Flexible
With Kubernetes under the hood, all the ecosystem and advanced functionality is readily available when you need it.
Ready to roll?
It's quick and easy to get started.
No credit card required.