Overview
Istio is an open-source service mesh that provides traffic management, security, observability, and policy control for microservices. Built on the Envoy proxy, Istio enables advanced networking and governance features without requiring changes to application code.
Key Features
- Fine-grained traffic control and routing (traffic splitting, circuit breaking, rate limiting).
- Enhanced service-to-service security (mTLS and access control policies).
- Rich observability including distributed tracing, metrics, and logging integration.
- Pluggable architecture supporting extensible policies and custom behaviors.
Use Cases
- Large microservice platforms that need centralized traffic governance and policy enforcement.
- Enterprise environments requiring service-level security and fine access controls.
- Cloud-native apps that need deep observability for troubleshooting and performance tuning.
Technical Highlights
- Envoy-based data plane with a control plane for policy and configuration distribution.
- Supports multiple deployment patterns and deep Kubernetes integration.
- Mature community and ecosystem suitable for critical production network governance.