LXC vs Podman

LXC is free software for creating and managing Linux system or application containers through Linux kernel containment features. It aims to make each container resemble a standard Linux installation without a separate kernel. The project includes the liblxc library, container control tools, distribution templates and API bindings for Python 3, Lua, Go, Ruby and Haskell. Process containment uses kernel namespaces, AppArmor and SELinux profiles, seccomp policies, chroots, kernel capabilities and cgroups. Unprivileged containers map container root to an unprivileged host user. LXC is included in most Linux distributions and is generally installed through the distribution package manager. Listed requirements include a supported C library and Linux kernel 2.6.32 or later. LXC 7.0 and 6.0 are listed as long-term support releases through June 1, 2031 and June 1, 2029. Most code uses GNU LGPLv2.1+, with some BSD 2-clause or GNU GPLv2 components.

Podman manages containers, pods, and images, with workflows for finding, running, building, and sharing container workloads. It is a free, daemonless container engine with a command line comparable to Docker’s CLI; most commands can run as a regular user without additional privileges. Podman Desktop adds a graphical application for installing and working with Podman and other container engines on Windows, macOS, and Linux. It can build images from Dockerfiles or Containerfiles, pull images from remote repositories, and manage accounts for pushing images to registries. Podman can run Kubernetes YAML locally, generate YAML from pods, and deploy to existing Kubernetes environments. It can find and pull containers from Docker Hub, Quay.io, internal registries, or vendors. On macOS and Windows it listens for Docker API clients. The project lists integrations including Visual Studio Code, Cirrus CLI, GitHub Actions, and kind. Podman is licensed under Apache License 2.0. Its security foundations include rootless and daemonless containers, SELinux support, network policy enforcement, and immutable containers.