AAP 2.6 Tested Deployment Models: Growth & Enterprise Topologies Guide

Red Hat tests Ansible Automation Platform 2.6 against specific deployment topologies — use these reference architectures for supported, production-ready deployments. Choose between growth topologies (single-node, resource-efficient) and enterprise topologies (multi-node, redundant).

Deployment Models Overview

Container Growth Topology

Best for: Organizations getting started, development environments, or resource-constrained deployments.

All AAP components run on a single VM:

┌─────────────────────────────┐
│        Single RHEL Host     │
│                             │
│  ┌──────────────────────┐   │
│  │  Platform Gateway    │   │
│  ├──────────────────────┤   │
│  │  Automation Controller│  │
│  ├──────────────────────┤   │
│  │  Automation Hub      │   │
│  ├──────────────────────┤   │
│  │  Event-Driven Ansible│   │
│  ├──────────────────────┤   │
│  │  PostgreSQL Database │   │
│  ├──────────────────────┤   │
│  │  Redis (standalone)  │   │
│  └──────────────────────┘   │
└─────────────────────────────┘

System Requirements

Inventory Groups

See also: AAP 2.6 Install Guide: Containerized, RPM & OpenShift Methods (2026)

Container Enterprise Topology

Best for: Production deployments requiring high availability, redundancy, and scalability.

Components distributed across multiple VMs:

┌──────────────┐  ┌──────────────┐
│  Gateway 1   │  │  Gateway 2   │
└──────┬───────┘  └──────┬───────┘
       │                 │
┌──────┴─────────────────┴───────┐
│         Load Balancer          │
└──────┬─────────────────┬───────┘
       │                 │
┌──────┴───────┐  ┌──────┴───────┐
│ Controller 1 │  │ Controller 2 │
└──────────────┘  └──────────────┘
       │                 │
┌──────┴───────┐  ┌──────┴───────┐
│  Hub Node    │  │  EDA Node    │
└──────────────┘  └──────────────┘
       │                 │
┌──────┴─────────────────┴───────┐
│       PostgreSQL Database      │
│    (external or dedicated)     │
└────────────────────────────────┘

Additional Requirements

• Multiple VMs for redundancy
• External load balancer
• Redis in cluster mode
• Dedicated database server recommended
• Receptor mesh for execution nodes

OpenShift Operator Topologies

Operator Growth Topology

Single namespace deployment on OpenShift — suitable for development and small teams.

Operator Enterprise Topology

Multi-namespace or multi-cluster deployment with:

• Separate namespaces for controller, hub, and EDA
• Horizontal pod autoscaling
• External PostgreSQL for data durability
• Multi-AZ deployment for HA

RPM Topologies (Deprecated)

⚠️ Only for RHEL 9 during AAP 2.6 lifecycle to support migrations. Will be removed in AAP 2.7.

Same growth/enterprise patterns as containerized, but installed directly via RPM packages instead of Podman containers.

Network Port Requirements

All topologies require these ports:

Platform Communication

Database & Infrastructure

Component NGINX Ports

Supported Configurations

Choosing Your Topology

Use Growth When:

• Evaluating or testing AAP
• Small team (< 20 users)
• Budget-constrained
• Development/staging environment
• < 100 managed hosts

Use Enterprise When:

• Production workloads
• High availability required
• Multiple teams sharing the platform
• Compliance requirements (audit trails, separation)
• 100+ managed hosts
• 24/7 uptime expectations

Database Considerations

Managed (Installer-Controlled)

• PostgreSQL 15 installed and managed by the AAP installer
• Backup/restore handled by AAP tools
• Simplest option for growth topology

External (Customer-Provided)

• PostgreSQL 15, 16, or 17
• ICU support must be enabled (not default on AWS RDS, Azure SQL, EDB)
• PostgreSQL 16/17 must handle backup/restore independently
• Required for enterprise topology with dedicated DB servers

FAQ

Can I use a topology not listed by Red Hat?

Yes, but Red Hat only provides "commercially reasonable support" for non-tested topologies. Stick to tested topologies for production environments to ensure full support coverage.

Can I start with growth and migrate to enterprise later?

Yes. Start with the growth topology and scale to enterprise as your needs grow. The migration involves adding nodes and redistributing components — the AAP installer handles this.

Do I need a load balancer for growth topology?

No. Growth topology runs everything on a single host. A load balancer is only needed for enterprise topology with multiple gateway or controller nodes.

What's the minimum for a production deployment?

Red Hat recommends the enterprise topology for production. At minimum: 2 gateway nodes (HA), 2 controller nodes, 1 hub, 1 EDA controller, 1 dedicated database server. Total: 7 VMs.

See also: Deploy and Configure the MCP Server for Ansible Automation Platform: Complete Guide (Containerized and OpenShift)

Conclusion

Use the container growth topology for getting started and development. Deploy the container enterprise topology for production. OpenShift operator for cloud-native organizations. Avoid new RPM installations — they're deprecated and will be removed in AAP 2.7.

Related Articles

• AAP 2.6 Install Guide
• AAP 2.6 Upgrade Guide
• What's New in AAP 2.6
• Ansible for Kubernetes