Why Helm is the Standard for Kubernetes Apps

Kubernetes has evolved from an experimental playground to the de facto standard for cloud-native applications in recent years. Its flexibility and scalability are impressive, but they come at a cost: significantly increased complexity in managing deployments, configurations, and releases. Anyone seriously operating or delivering software on Kubernetes will sooner or later face the question: How do I package my application so that it is reproducible, maintainable, and easily integrable?

The answer, in most cases, is Helm.

Helm vs. Kustomize vs. Manifests

There are different approaches to defining and deploying Kubernetes applications. Three variants dominate the practice:

• Standard YAML Manifests: These are simple, direct, and transparent. However, once more than one environment or team is involved, they reach their limits. Reusability, parameterization, and structure are lacking. Scripting becomes mandatory, and maintainability becomes an issue.
• Kustomize: A more elegant approach that allows overlays and is based on native Kubernetes resources. Kustomize is suitable for simple variations but hits functional limits in more complex scenarios. Notably, concepts such as versioning, dependency management, or custom hooks are missing.
• Helm: Helm is a full-fledged package manager for Kubernetes, comparable to apt or yum in the operating system context. It combines declarative configuration with templates, package logic, and a CLI for installation, upgrades, and rollbacks. Helm is not a replacement for Kubernetes YAML – it is an organizational structure that packages them logically and reusable.

Three Key Reasons Helm Has Prevailed

1. Reusability and Parameterization Helm allows applications to be packaged as a chart and adapted to any context using values.yaml or inline values. This way, the same application can be rolled out for development, testing, and production without duplicating the chart or maintaining separate variations everywhere.
2. GitOps and CI/CD Integration Modern deployment tools like Argo CD, Flux, or GitLab CI/CD natively support Helm. This is particularly valuable in Managed Kubernetes environments. This means: Helm charts can be integrated into automated pipelines without further adjustments. This saves time, reduces sources of error, and allows teams to focus on code rather than infrastructure.
3. Broad Knowledge and Tooling Ecosystem Helm is widely used in the engineering community. There are thousands of public and private charts, well-documented best practices, and integrations into almost every relevant tool. This not only reduces the onboarding time for new team members but also prevents dependency on proprietary tools or specialized knowledge.

Why Software Vendors Should Use Helm

For companies developing and distributing software for Kubernetes, Helm is the logical standard. The advantages are clear:

• Better Integration Capability with Customers Most companies that use Kubernetes productively use Helm – directly or indirectly through their GitOps or CI/CD platform. Delivering software as a Helm chart minimizes integration costs and accelerates time-to-value for the customer.
• Reduced Support and Enablement Effort Customers know how Helm works. There is no need to maintain custom installation scripts or explain proprietary deployment mechanisms. This reduces complexity in sales, proof-of-concepts, and operations.
• Scalable Release and Upgrade Strategies Versioning, rollbacks, canary releases, or multi-tenant deployments can be structured with Helm. This is essential for SaaS providers and enterprise scenarios.
• Openness Instead of Lock-in Helm is open, standardized, and available under a liberal open-source license. Customers can work with existing tools, and providers do not have to defend a black box. This builds trust without giving up control.

Conclusion: Helm is Not Perfect, But Pragmatic

No question: Helm has weaknesses. Templating is not type-safe, and debugging can be tedious with complex charts. However, compared to alternatives, Helm offers the best compromise between standardization, flexibility, and community support. Anyone seriously operating or distributing software on Kubernetes should consider Helm as the minimum standard.

For those who want to address user-friendliness, security contexts, or dynamic chart generation, they can build on this – but not without laying the foundation.

How do you package your Kubernetes applications? Do you use Helm productively, or do you still rely on alternative approaches? We look forward to your experiences.