What is Contour?
Contour is an open source Kubernetes ingress controller that works by deploying the Envoy proxy as a reverse proxy and load balancer. Contour provides a control plane for Envoy that watches Kubernetes API servers for changes and updates Envoy configuration automatically.
Key features of Contour include:
- HTTP and HTTPS routing for Kubernetes services
- Name and header based routing
- Multi-team support with virtual hosting
- TLS termination and SSL passthrough
- Weighted load balancing
- Health checking
- Dynamic configuration updates
- Ingressrati metrics
- External authorization services support
As a Kubernetes native ingress, Contour is optimized to work with Kubernetes concepts like Services and Ingresses natively. It focuses purely on traffic routing and load balancing, providing a control plane for the Envoy data plane. Contour supports Kubernetes and OpenShift deployments.