Podman provides a Docker-compatible container runtime that addresses several architectural concerns with the traditional Docker daemon model. By running daemonless and rootless by default, Podman offers improved security posture for container workloads.
Key differentiators include native pod support (groups of containers sharing resources, similar to Kubernetes pods), systemd integration for running containers as services, and the ability to generate Kubernetes YAML from running containers. Podman Desktop provides a GUI experience similar to Docker Desktop.
Podman is completely free and open source under the Apache 2.0 license. It's included by default in RHEL, Fedora, and CentOS Stream. Podman Desktop is available for macOS, Windows, and Linux.