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Orchestration vs Automation - Understanding the Difference

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Introduction to Orchestration vs Automation

In this insight, we will show you the basic difference: Orchestration vs Automation. Cloud automation represents a job accomplished without human interruption, whereas Cloud orchestration represents arranging and coordinating automated tasks resulting in an amalgamated workflow. These are the best tools used to improve IT processes in the industry. As many IT teams have learned, the cloud journey is never easy, although the right practices can help.
The cloud services market is forecasted to rise 17.5 percent in 2019 to a total of $214.3 billion, up from $182.4 billion in 2018. Source: Gartner, Inc.
Cloud Automation is an all-around term describing the tools and processes that aim to reduce manual efforts to manage complex multi-cloud environments. Automation can disentangle critical business processes and enhance customer experience at scale. But Engineers have to complete hundreds of manual tasks to deliver, even under automation. This is where Cloud Orchestration becomes the key. Let's understand the terms one-by-one ahead.

What is Cloud Automation?

Cloud Automation refers to software solutions automating cloud computing services' installation, configuration, and management processes. In other words, cloud automation aims to reduce manual efforts on repetitive tasks while working on the cloud. 'Orchestration vs Automation' becomes a vital point to consider now. However, automating all the modules in the cloud would be a convoluted task. Installing virtual machines, servers, and networks further add to their difficulty. You need to manage and monitor the resources after deployment to ensure they perform up to your expectations.

Need of Automation

Automation has dived a long way, from being just a trend to a must-have in an enterprise. It has become a key factor for the successful cloud journey, not just during migration but also for ongoing optimization. IT Infrastructure is bound to increase owing to the skyrocketing pace of businesses around. This necessitates the demand for new services with faster and constant access to data. To meet these expectations, the shift from manual to automated cloud resources management becomes a must. Thinking of the 'Orchestration vs Automation' debate? For most organizations, cloud resources are too complicated for humans to handle and manage in real-time. With the increasing amount of cloud operations, the need for automation becomes essential. Automation's real significance is to make multi-cloud management tasks as efficient as possible to achieve the cloud's promised value.

What is Cloud Orchestration?

Cloud orchestration is a process that uses programming techniques to manage the interconnections and interactions among workloads on public and private cloud infrastructure. An essential issue of orchestration vs automation includes the company and coordination of automated obligations to increase a consolidated, efficient workflow. With corporations increasingly more the usage of a mixture of cloud offerings and the public, private, hybrid, and multi-cloud services, the resulting ecosystem is tremendously complex, with facts and applications running across a couple of environments. To manage these diverse workloads in an automated, orderly fashion, groups need cloud orchestration gear to manage the whole lot as an unmarried workflow. Orchestration also enables enterprises to make their products available to a variety of cloud environments. Thus, increasing the product's exposure to a broader audience and expanding revenue opportunities for the company.

Need of Orchestration

Cloud orchestration interests many IT organizations and ' DevOps Processes' adopters to speed the delivery of services and reduce costs. It automates the management, coordination, and organization of complicated computer systems, services, and middleware. It eliminates the potential for errors introduced into provisioning, scaling, or other cloud processes.

Orchestration supports cloud resource delivery to customers and end-users, including a self-service model where users request resources without IT's involvement.

It caters to the VM sprawl issue by providing visibility and control over cloud resources and implicit costs. It can simplify the communication as well as the connections from one workload to other apps/users. Clearing 'Orchestration vs Automation' debate now, right?

Orchestration vs Automation: The Difference

Both Automation and Orchestration are used crucially in common IT capitals. Below are some special key differences between the two for you to understand.
Orchestration Feature Automation
It can automate a set of multiple tasks at once. It automates arrangement, management and coordination of computer systems and services for executing a larger workforce. Concept It sets up single and exclusive tasks like web server launching and configuring, service termination, etc. on its own.
It enumerates resources, Identity, and Access Management (IAM) roles, etc. for achieving accurate results, while surging the speed of operations. It utilizes the resources more efficiently. Resource Utilization Cloud Automation employs resources independently for automating tasks.
It focuses on ensuring comprehensive performance of all undergoing automated tasks in a definite order concerning one another and within a workflow. It also optimizes coding and thereby preventing errors. Performance It involves huge amounts of coding and is conducted in a well- defined sequence under strict policies and security guidelines.
Cloud Orchestration requires less intervention from personnel. Role of Personnel Engineers must finish all the manual tasks to deliver a new environment.
It only requires monitoring and alerting for its workflows. Monitoring and Alerting Cloud Automation can send the data to a third party reporting services.
It handles all permissions and security of automation tasks. Policy Decisions It does not typically implement any policy decisions which fall outside of OS- level ACLs.


Talking about Orchestration vs Automation, both can take place on an individual level and a company-wide level. It’s no longer a debate of orchestration vs automation. Instead, it becomes a matter of coopetition, thereby implementing them in the right degree and combination. This grants freedom to any company in lowering IT costs, reducing the staff needs while increasing productivity. Some other valuable resources may be reconsidered for further improvement and innovation by streamlining routine automation and its orchestration. Cloud automation and orchestration sustain more cost-efficient company and DevOps/CloudOps pipelines.
Cloud Orchestration vs Automation
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