Tekton

Google engineers originally developed Tekton as the build component of Knative before contributing the framework to the Continuous Delivery Foundation. That lineage established Tekton as a modular platform for constructing delivery workflows on top of Kubernetes primitives rather than an off-the-shelf continuous integration server. Today, it supplies the declarative building blocks that engineering organizations use to assemble specialized internal delivery pipelines.

Where Tekton fits

Tekton occupies a different tier of the continuous integration stack than turnkey platforms such as GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, or CircleCI. Instead of packaging dispatchers, user permissions, and runner infrastructure into a hosted dashboard, Tekton provides Kubernetes custom resources including Tasks and Pipelines. Each pipeline step runs inside a container within a Kubernetes pod, avoiding static build servers. Hosted platforms monetize builds through per-minute fees, concurrency caps, and per-seat subscriptions. As build volume grows across microservice fleets, metered costs mount quickly. Tekton avoids runtime fees by executing workloads on an organization's existing Kubernetes infrastructure, utilizing spot instances or on-premises nodes without per-job charges.

That compute economy requires operational investment. Running pipelines natively turns pipeline maintenance into cluster management. Teams cannot simply push a workflow file and walk away; they must operate controllers, configure ingress for Tekton Triggers, provision storage volumes for shared workspaces, and prune completed pipeline objects. Organizations with platform teams trade hosted convenience for total execution control and lower compute bills. Without dedicated cluster engineers, cluster overhead can exceed commercial runner subscriptions.

What it does well

• Kubernetes-native pod scheduling: Each Task maps to a Kubernetes pod, letting steps share local volumes and run within custom security contexts.
• Declarative custom resources: Tasks and Pipelines are version-controlled Kubernetes manifests that integrate with GitOps deployment workflows.
• Supply chain provenance: Built-in integration with Tekton Chains produces cryptographically signed container images and verifiable SLSA provenance records.
• Modular task reuse: Decoupled Tasks separate step definitions from pipeline flow, letting platform teams share reusable build tasks across multiple repositories.