- Podman is usually used "rootless", but it doesn't have to be. It can also be used with rootful containers. It's still daemonless, though it can shim the Docker socket (very useful for using i.e. Docker Compose.)
- Docker can be used in a rootless fashion too. It will still run a daemon, but it can be a user service using user namespaces. Personally I think Podman does much better here.
Podman also has some other interesting advantages, like better systemd integrations. Sometimes Kubernetes just isn't necessarily; Podman + Systemd works well in a lot of those cases. (Note though that I have yet to try Quadlets.) Though unfortunately I don't think even the newer Quadlets integration has some basic niceties that Kubernetes has (like simple ways to do zero downtime deployments.)