Redpanda
Same Producers append records to topics; consumers read them in
order.
Kafka broker is Java process, with as extra moving parts.
Redpanda is C++ binary where these moving parts are not present
Kafka vs Redpanda
| Kafka (Java) | Redpanda (C++ Seaster) | |
|---|---|---|
| Written in | Java |
C++.
C++ is faster wrt Java - No GC Pauses, Latency more predictable |
| Latency | More. JVM + ZooKeeper/KRaft + Broker are seperate binaries | Everything in 1 C++ binary |
| clients, topics, consumer group | Same as kafka | |
| Partition Handling | Complex handling on shards |
Each CPU Core owns a shard of partitions No shared locks, no thread-pool hops for the hot path |
| Maintenance Effort | Big team required. Broker,Zookeeper, GC heap tuning. | Small team can handle. 1 binary. |
| Use case | Huge Infra. already-tuned Kafka | small team, fewer nodes |