Redpanda Has a Free API — Kafka Without the JVM

Redpanda is the Kafka-compatible streaming platform written in C++ — 10x faster, no JVM, no ZooKeeper, single binary deployment. And the free tier handles production workloads. Why Redpanda Over Kafka? Kafka requires Java, ZooKeeper (or KRaft), and complex tuning. Redpanda: 10x lower latency — p99 < 10ms vs Kafka's 100ms+ No JVM — written in C++, thread-per-core architecture No ZooKeeper — built-in Raft consensus Single binary — one process, no dependencies Kafka API compatible — use your existing Kafka clients Built-in Schema Registry — no separate Confluent service Built-in HTTP Proxy — produce/consume via REST Quick Start # Docker (single node) docker run -d --name redpanda \ -p 9092:9092 \ -p 8081:8081 \ -p 8082:8082 \ -p 9644:9644 \ docker.redpanda.com/redpandadata/redpanda:latest \ redpanda start --smp 1 --memory 1G --overprovisioned # Create a topic docker exec -it redpanda rpk topic create events --partitions 3 # List topics docker exec -it redpanda rpk topic list Produce Messa