Komodo vs Portainer vs Dockge 2026: Container Management UIs

TL;DR

Pick by what you do with containers, not by feature count. Dockge is for people who already think in docker-compose.yml and want a tidy web view of what's running. Portainer is the heavyweight enterprise-grade UI that scales from a single host to a Kubernetes fleet. Komodo (formerly Monitor) is the new-school option built around Git-based deployments, multi-server orchestration, and a clean Rust + Svelte stack — closest in spirit to a self-hosted Coolify lite.

Key Takeaways

Dockge — minimal, opinionated, compose-only. ~14K stars, MIT, built by the Uptime Kuma author.
Portainer — full container management platform. Free CE + paid Business with RBAC, OIDC, and edge agents. Apache 2.0 / commercial.
Komodo — multi-server orchestrator with Git-driven deploys, secrets, and stack-of-stacks. ~7K stars, AGPL-3.0, very active in 2026.
All three run as Docker containers, manage local + remote Docker hosts, and ship official images.
Best fit by use case: Dockge for "I run 8 stacks on one host," Portainer for "I have multiple environments and need RBAC," Komodo for "I want GitOps without K8s."

What Each Tool Optimizes For

Tool	Optimization	Mental Model
Dockge	Visibility into compose files you already write	"Compose, but on the web"
Portainer	Operating many container hosts, including Swarm and Kubernetes	"vCenter for containers"
Komodo	Declarative, Git-backed deploys across many servers	"Self-hosted Vercel for compose"

This is the most important framing in the comparison. None of these is a strict superset of the others.

Decision Table

Capability	Dockge	Portainer CE	Komodo
License	MIT	Apache 2.0 (CE) / Commercial (BE)	AGPL-3.0
Native compose editor	✅	✅	✅
Git-based deploys	❌	⚠️ (Stacks-from-Git, paid extras)	✅ (first-class)
Multi-host management	⚠️ (agent-based, basic)	✅	✅
Kubernetes support	❌	✅	❌
Docker Swarm support	❌	✅	⚠️ (limited)
RBAC	❌	CE: basic / BE: full	✅
OIDC / SSO	❌	BE only	✅
Secrets management	❌	✅	✅
Webhook / CI deploys	❌	⚠️	✅
Resource overhead	~30 MB RAM	~150 MB RAM	~100 MB RAM
Mobile-friendly UI	✅	⚠️	✅
Best on	One host	Many hosts, mixed orchestrators	Many hosts, GitOps

Dockge: The Minimalist

Dockge is what happens when the author of Uptime Kuma builds a Docker UI: small, focused, and ruthless about scope. It only manages compose stacks. It does not pretend to be Portainer.

Strengths

Edits real docker-compose.yml files on disk — no proprietary database to back up
Interactive web terminal per container
Lightweight; runs comfortably on a Raspberry Pi
The UI is one of the cleanest in the category

Weaknesses

No RBAC, no SSO. Single-admin tool by design.
No Git integration; no GitOps workflow.
Multi-host support exists but is the weakest of the three.

Choose Dockge if you have one server with 5–20 stacks and want a calm, readable web view of them.

A direct head-to-head with Portainer for the single-host scenario is in Portainer vs Dockge.

Portainer: The Enterprise Workhorse

Portainer has been the default container UI for nearly a decade. The Community Edition is genuinely useful; the Business Edition adds the RBAC, OIDC, and team features that operations teams expect.

Strengths

Manages Docker Standalone, Docker Swarm, and Kubernetes from one dashboard
Edge agent makes remote, NAT-bound hosts manageable without VPN gymnastics
Mature stack templates and "App Templates" library
Business Edition has the strongest RBAC of the three
Years of documentation, training, and integrations

Weaknesses

Heaviest of the three (around 150 MB RAM, several Go services)
Most powerful features (RBAC, OIDC, custom roles) are paywalled in BE
The UI is dense; new users need a guided tour
Stacks created in the UI live in Portainer's database, not as files on disk — backup story is "back up the volume"

Choose Portainer if you operate multiple environments, need real RBAC, or have any Kubernetes in the mix. The Portainer vs Yacht vs Dockge roundup compares it against more lightweight options.

Komodo: The GitOps Newcomer

Komodo (renamed from Monitor in 2024) is the most architecturally interesting of the three. It splits into a Core server and Periphery agents, supports many remote hosts, and treats every deployment as a "Stack" pulled from a Git repository.

Strengths

Git-as-source-of-truth for compose files — every change is a commit
Multi-server orchestration without Kubernetes complexity
Built-in secrets, environment variables, and webhook triggers
Resource graphs (CPU, memory, disk) per host and per container, no extra Grafana
Active 2025–2026 development with weekly releases

Weaknesses

Smaller community than Portainer; fewer Stack Overflow answers
Documentation is improving but still assumes Docker fluency
AGPL-3.0 licensing concerns some commercial users (network-use clause)
No Kubernetes story — strictly Docker / compose

Choose Komodo if you want a "self-hosted Coolify-lite" experience — Git push triggers a deploy, multi-server, no Vercel involved. If your scope is Vercel-replacement rather than container UI, Coolify vs Caprover vs Dokku is the right comparison.

Resource Footprint

Tested on a 1 vCPU / 1 GB Hetzner CX11 with 8 sample stacks and 25 containers:

Tool	Idle RAM	Idle CPU	Disk
Dockge	~30 MB	<1%	~80 MB
Portainer CE	~150 MB	~1–2%	~200 MB
Komodo Core	~100 MB	~1%	~150 MB

All three are negligible on modern hardware. The real cost difference shows up on Pi-class hardware, where Dockge wins comfortably.

Migrating Between Them

Dockge → Komodo: Trivial. Dockge already keeps your compose files on disk; commit them to Git and point Komodo at the repo.
Dockge → Portainer: Import the compose files as Stacks. Portainer will copy them into its own database; remember to back up the Portainer volume after.
Portainer → Komodo: Painful. Stacks created inside Portainer's UI need to be exported to compose files first, then committed to Git.
Portainer → Dockge: Same — extract compose files first, then point Dockge at the directory.

The lesson: if you anticipate changing tools later, prefer ones (Dockge, Komodo) that keep compose files as ordinary files on disk.

Who Should Choose What

Choose Dockge if:

You manage one host (or a small number) and live in compose files
You want the smallest, calmest UI in the category
You have no need for SSO, RBAC, or Git-driven deploys

Choose Portainer if:

You operate multiple environments, possibly mixing Docker, Swarm, and Kubernetes
You need RBAC, OIDC, or audit logs
You're already invested in the Portainer ecosystem (templates, docs, training)

Choose Komodo if:

You want GitOps for compose without learning Kubernetes
You manage a fleet of small servers and want one dashboard for them
You want a modern, actively developed alternative to Portainer that isn't Kubernetes-flavored

Verdict

These three are not really competitors — they're three different jobs. If you can articulate your job in one sentence ("I want to see what's on my one server" / "I run a fleet across orchestrators" / "I want Git push to deploy"), the right tool is obvious. If you're undecided, start with Dockge; the migration cost out is the lowest and you'll learn what you actually want from the next layer.

The SaaS-to-Self-Hosted Migration Guide (Free PDF)