Who this is for: Developers and DevOps engineers who want to understand how to run databases reliably on Kubernetes — from the basics of StatefulSets, to replication consistency, to choosing between self-managed and Operator-based approaches. Table of Contents Why Databases on Kubernetes Are Tricky Your Three Options Understanding StatefulSets How Replication Works Avoiding Data Inconsistency Self-Managed vs Kubernetes Operator Detailed Task Comparison When to Choose What Summary 1. Why Databases on Kubernetes Are Tricky Kubernetes was originally designed for stateless workloads — apps where any pod can be replaced at any time without data loss. A web server is stateless. A database is not. Databases are stateful — they hold your data on disk, they have a concept of a primary (the one that accepts writes) and replicas (copies), and if you restart them carelessly, you risk data corruption or split-brain scenarios.…