Orchestration vs. Choreography

Question

What are the differences between service orchestration and service choreography from an intra-organization point of view.

Answer 1

Andrei and others did a good job explaining what is orchestration and what is choreography. For the software architect choosing between these two alternatives, it is also important to compare them with respect to different qualities.

Orchestration pluses over choreography

• Reliability: Orchestration platforms have built-in support for error handling and transaction management (compensating transactions). In choreography, custom-developed workflow and error handling tends to be more error-prone.
• Modifiability: Creating and changing process workflows and complex service compositions is easier in the visual BPM tools found in orchestration platforms.

Choreography pluses over orchestration

• Performance: Orchestration incurs a performance overhead due to workflow script interpretation and the additional layer of the orchestration platform itself.

• Cost: Choreography does not require additional middleware or language, which have associated learning curves and governance burden.

EDIT

An orchestration solution might introduce a SPOF if the orchestrator element doesn't employ a mechanism for high availability. Thanks @Deepak por pointing this out in a comment.