# Kafka UI - features, pros and cons

**URL:** <https://forum.confluent.io/t/kafka-ui-features-pros-and-cons/697>\
**Category:** Graphical tools\
**Created:** [5 February 2021 13:42 UTC](https://forum.confluent.io/t/kafka-ui-features-pros-and-cons/697 "2021-02-05T13:42:46Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![whatsupbros](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.confluent.io/whatsupbros/32/239_2.png) [@whatsupbros](https://forum.confluent.io/u/whatsupbros)\
**Post date:** [5 February 2021 13:42 UTC](https://forum.confluent.io/t/kafka-ui-features-pros-and-cons/697/1 "2021-02-05T13:42:46Z")

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Let’s discuss the [kafka-ui](https://github.com/provectus/kafka-ui) project.

![](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/uploads/confluentcommunity/original/2X/d/d0922153167be5921669afb8a23049d9cf0c71d8.gif)

The idea (was born [here](https://forum.confluent.io/t/section-to-discuss-guis-on-top-of-kafka-cluster-like-control-center/607/7)) is to share your experience so far, your thoughts, and pros and cons which you already noticed!

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**Author:** ![whatsupbros](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.confluent.io/whatsupbros/32/239_2.png) [@whatsupbros](https://forum.confluent.io/u/whatsupbros)\
**Post date:** [14 March 2022 09:20 UTC](https://forum.confluent.io/t/kafka-ui-features-pros-and-cons/697/2 "2022-03-14T09:20:13Z")

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Recently gave it a try. And this is what I can say:

**Features:**

- Sleak interface
- Support of Schema Registry, Kafka Connect and ksqlDB
- Support of Avro
- Gives very good overview on your Consumers
- Runs in a container

**Discovered issues:**

- Requires `DescribeConfigs` CLUSTER level ACL or `AuditAdmin` RBAC role to start, which are rarely given to end users
- Not clear how to use “centrally” (so that every end user uses their credentials to access Kafka Cluster, and not the credentials with which the service started)
- Doesn’t support SSL and mTLS for Schema Registry connection (which leads to inability to deserialize Avro messages if the schemas are in a secured Schema Registry), addressed [here](https://github.com/provectus/kafka-ui/issues/930)
- Doesn’t support SSL and mTLS for Kafka Connect (and probably ksqlDB - this wasn’t tested)
- Configuration is not easy, due to poorly organized documentation, addressed [here](https://github.com/provectus/kafka-ui/issues/779#issuecomment-1050679993)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![whatsupbros](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.confluent.io/whatsupbros/32/239_2.png) [@whatsupbros](https://forum.confluent.io/u/whatsupbros)\
**Post date:** [11 July 2022 11:29 UTC](https://forum.confluent.io/t/kafka-ui-features-pros-and-cons/697/3 "2022-07-11T11:29:14Z")

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> [@whatsupbros](#):
>
> - Doesn’t support SSL and mTLS for Schema Registry connection (which leads to inability to deserialize Avro messages if the schemas are in a secured Schema Registry), addressed [here](https://github.com/provectus/kafka-ui/issues/930)
> - Doesn’t support SSL and mTLS for Kafka Connect (and probably ksqlDB - this wasn’t tested)

Was able to overcome this by providing it with Truststore and Keystore in JVM properties like this (this is an additional environment variable set for the `kafka-ui` service in my `docker-compose.yml`:

```auto
JAVA_OPTS: "-Djavax.net.ssl.keyStore=/path/to/keystore.jks -Djavax.net.ssl.trustStore=/path/to/truststore.jks -Djavax.net.ssl.keyStorePassword=$KEYSTORE_PASSWORD -Djavax.net.ssl.trustStorePassword=$TRUSTSTORE_PASSWORD"

```

Keystore and Truststore passwords are provided in the `.env` file.