Quick Answer: The Pros and Cons of Platform Engineering

Our quick answers series is here to deliver easy, speedy answers to some of the most common cloud tech queries. Today, we’ll be going over the advantages and disadvantages of platform engineering.

Platform engineering has gained immense coverage over the past few years. But organizations are still doubtful about investing in platform engineering. Therefore, let's discuss the most common advantages and disadvantages of Platform Engineering. First, let's cover the benefits.

What are Advantages of Platform Engineering?

So how can platform engineering help?

Highly Consistent Infrastructure

Platform engineering ensures consistency in all applications by providing a standard method of building and running applications. This consistency reduces errors, troubleshooting, and makes the collaboration of development teams easier.

Improved Security

Platform engineering integrates security into the platform itself and ensures that the developed applications meet all security standards. By relying on the platform, developers can focus on securing their applications and ensuring infrastructure security.

Better Cost Management

By using platform engineering, organizations can manage the costs of infrastructure effectively by centralizing resource management. Consequently, the development team is less likely to create unnecessary infrastructure, which makes the utilization of resources more efficient and controls overall cost. 

Quick Feature Delivery

Platform engineering enables developers to focus on developing new features through a standard and pre-built infrastructure. This focus enables organizations to deliver new features quickly and respond swiftly to changing market needs.

Ensures Continuous Development of Tools and Processes

The processes of development need to evolve as your product grows. Over time, your stack grows with new requirements and additional technologies. You may need to add a new storage system or adhere to another regulatory standard. Platform engineering ensures the toolchain develops in sync. Without it, you would need to make ad-hoc workflow adjustments that may be poorly documented and challenging to maintain. Enabling developers to access a platform engineering team ensures that any concerns are addressed without any delays in the product release.

What are the Disadvantages of Platform Engineering?

Now we've covered the advantages, let's look at the challenges of platform engineering.

Increased Complexity

Platform engineering implementation can add complexity to your infrastructure which can be very challenging to manage for small-scale teams.

Potential Drawbacks of Heavily Depending on the Platform

The high dependency on the platform can make it hard to switch to a different technology or provider.

Compatibility Issues

The platform may not be compatible with all technologies and tools that the Devs team is using. It causes friction and slows down the process.

Conclusion

In conclusion, platform engineering offers several advantages that include consistent infrastructure, improved security, better cost management, quick feature delivery, and continuous development of tools and processes. These benefits enhance efficiency, reduce errors, and facilitate rapid response to market demands. However, there are also potential drawbacks, such as increased complexity, limitations in switching technologies or providers due to heavy dependency, and compatibility issues with existing tools. Organizations must carefully evaluate their specific needs and resources to determine if the advantages outweigh the disadvantages and if platform engineering is the right approach for their software development and infrastructure management requirements.

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