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Volcano

Volcano
open source / Overall score: 3.2

Batch scheduling system for Kubernetes, hosted by the CNCF, aimed at AI, machine learning and big-data workloads that Kubernetes' default scheduler handles poorly. Volcano adds gang scheduling, queues with fair-share and preemption, and GPU-aware placement, so a distributed training job either gets all the accelerators it asked for or waits rather than deadlocking on a partial allocation.

Ships as container images and Helm charts with no package-registry channel, so adoption bands on stars. Verified 2026-09-15 via the repository and its recursive tree.

Openness

5 high confidence
5.0
license
Apache-2.0(OSI)
source
public(the scheduler you run builds from this repo)
core-gated
ungated(a 2,861-entry recursive tree carries one root LICENSE and no path matching enterprise, ee, commercial or proprietary)

Apache-2.0 throughout, with no commercial edition to withhold anything from. The 2,861-entry recursive tree of the default branch carries a single governing Apache-2.0 LICENSE and no enterprise, ee or commercial path, and Volcano is a CNCF project rather than a vendor product, so there is no paid tier for a core to be gated against.

  • https://github.com/volcano-sh/volcano recorded 2026-09-15

    Repository page for volcano-sh/volcano: Apache-2.0 license, public and unarchived, described as 'A Cloud Native Batch System (Project under CNCF)'. Establishes the license and that the source is public.

  • https://api.github.com/repos/volcano-sh/volcano/git/trees/master?recursive=1 recorded 2026-09-15

    Full untruncated recursive tree of the default branch, 2,861 entries. One root LICENSE. No path matches enterprise, ee, commercial or proprietary. A tree lists paths; it is cited for that and for nothing about the vendor's offerings.

  • https://www.cncf.io/projects/volcano/ recorded 2026-09-16

    Volcano's project page on cncf.io, establishing that the project is hosted by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation rather than owned by a vendor, so no commercial party is positioned to withhold functionality from the published source.

Adoption

2 low confidence
2.0

5,951 GitHub stars. Volcano publishes no package-registry artifact - it ships as container images and a Helm chart - so no usage-volume channel exists for it and the band rests on stars, which measure attention rather than use. The stars route caps at level 3 for that reason.

Capability

5 medium confidence
5.0

Volcano's own scheduler makes the placement decision for the pods in a PodGroup and admits them as one allocation, which is what band 5 asks for: it chooses the machines and reserves a multi-machine set together. It sits level with the other schedulers in this category that do the same thing rather than above them.

  • https://github.com/volcano-sh/volcano recorded 2026-09-15

    Repository description and README for volcano-sh/volcano as a cloud-native batch system under the CNCF, the basis for the gang-scheduling and queue feature reading.

Verified 2026-09-15