Container networking and security solution for Kubernetes clusters with eBPF, Linux, Windows, and VPP data plane options
Calico is an open-source container networking and security solution designed for Kubernetes environments. It provides network connectivity and security policies for containerized workloads across multiple data planes including eBPF, standard Linux, Windows, and VPP. The project supports multiple cloud providers, bare metal deployments, and various Linux distributions.
The solution implements Kubernetes network policies and offers granular access controls with WireGuard encryption capabilities. Calico includes flexible networking options such as BGP routing, VXLAN overlays, and service advertisement. It integrates with existing Kubernetes clusters without requiring changes to application code.
Calico is maintained by Tigera and has an active community of over 200 contributors. The project powers over 8 million nodes daily across 166 countries. System administrators, DevOps engineers, and platform teams use Calico to implement network segmentation, security policies, and multi-cluster connectivity in production Kubernetes environments. The project includes the calicoctl CLI tool for managing Calico resources and troubleshooting network issues.