Sidecar vs Sidecarless Architecture

Sidecar vs Sidecarless Architecture An architecture diagram generated by Archify. Pod A · application · Traditional sidecar model (Istio) Pod A application Sidecar Envoy · proxy-a · L4 + L7 · Traditional sidecar model (Istio) Sidecar Envoy proxy-a · L4 + L7 Sidecar Envoy · proxy-b · L4 + L7 · Traditional sidecar model (Istio) Sidecar Envoy proxy-b · L4 + L7 Pod B · application · Traditional sidecar model (Istio) Pod B application Pod A · application · Cilium Service Mesh model Pod A application eBPF datapath · Linux kernel · L3/L4 · Cilium Service Mesh model eBPF datapath Linux kernel · L3/L4 Node Envoy · 1 per node · L7 processing · Cilium Service Mesh model Node Envoy 1 per node · L7 processing Pod B · application · Cilium Service Mesh model Pod B application app traffic network (mTLS) app traffic app traffic L3/L4 in kernel L7 only when needed after L7 processing Traditional sidecar model (Istio) Cilium Service Mesh model Legend Application Pod Per-node Envoy (L7) Kernel eBPF datapath Per-Pod sidecar proxy (Envoy)