Compare software

Cockpit Podman vs Podman Desktop: catalog facts
Cockpit Podman	Podman Desktop
Free Free and open source under the LGPL 2.1 licence.	Free Free and open source under the Apache 2.0 licence, with no company size restriction.
Linux, Web, Self-hosted	Windows, macOS, Linux
Browser interface for Podman on a server Integrates with the existing Cockpit console	No licence fee regardless of company size Installs and updates Podman itself, so there is one thing to manage
Requires Cockpit to be installed on the server Podman only, not Docker	Electron, so it is heavy for a dashboard Podman's rootless model behaves differently from Docker in ways that surprise people
Self-hosted	Downloadable app
Open source	Open source
License: LGPL-2.1	License: Apache-2.0
Not stated if an account is needed	No account needed
Not stated if it works offline	Works offline
Official website Full listing and sources Checked September 23, 2026	Official website Full listing and sources Checked September 21, 2026

Catalog facts only. Anything “not stated” is unconfirmed. Check full listings for details.