I don't get these recent anti-Kubernetes posts, yes if you're deploying a simple app then there are alternatives which are easier, but as your app starts to get more complex then suddenly you'll be wishing you had the Kubernetes API.

I'd use Kubernetes even if I was spinning up a single VM and installing k3s on it. It's a universal deployment target.

Spinning up a cluster isn't the easiest thing, but I don't understand how a lot of the complaints around this come from sysadmin-type people who replace Kubernetes with spinning up VMs instead. The main complexity I've found from managing a cluster is the boring sysadmin stuff, PKI, firewall rules, scripts to automate. Kubernetes itself is pretty rock solid. A lot of cluster failure modes still result in your app still working. Etcd can be a pain but if you want you can even replace that with a SQL database for moderate sized clusters if that's more your thing (easier to manage HA control plane then too if you've already got a HA SQL server).

Or yes just use a managed Kubernetes cluster.

lol, even if you have complex apps there are always easier solutions than Kubernetes. It is evident that you have never run such an app and are just talking about it. Otherwise, you would know the issues you would encounter with every update due to breaking changes. Not to mention that you need a high level of expertise and a dedicated team, which costs far more than running an app on Fargate. Recommending a managed Kubernetes cluster is nonsense, as it goes against the whole purpose of Kubernetes itself.