AWS CodeBuild vs GitLab comparison

Read 86 GitLab reviews

19,204 Views
4,417 Comparison Views

97% willing to recommend

AWS CodeBuild

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 5, 2025

GitLab and AWS CodeBuild are strong competitors in the CI/CD and source code management field. GitLab seems to have the upper hand with a comprehensive feature set that caters to larger enterprises demanding seamless pipeline management and versatile code reviews, while AWS CodeBuild is favored for its simple integration within the AWS ecosystem, offering cost-effective serverless build solutions.

Features: GitLab offers seamless CI/CD pipeline management, robust code review, and extensive repository management capabilities, which are well-suited for teams requiring structured control and peer code scrutiny. AWS CodeBuild, on the other hand, excels in its integration with AWS services, providing a scalable, serverless building environment and effective platform support for varied coding languages and builds.

Room for Improvement: GitLab needs to enhance its AWS integration to compete with other cloud services, improve third-party integration, and expand reporting capabilities to support project management. AWS CodeBuild users highlight the need for improved documentation, easier troubleshooting, and enhanced UI and workflow management to address complexity and environmental setups.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: GitLab is flexible, offering both on-premises and cloud deployment, supported by a strong open-source community, though some users feel limited support without a paid plan. AWS CodeBuild provides ease of deployment for companies using AWS, benefiting from AWS's broad support infrastructure but relying on community and internal knowledge for problem-solving.

Pricing and ROI: GitLab has various pricing tiers that cater to different business sizes and needs, but its higher cost tiers can be challenging for smaller teams. In contrast, AWS CodeBuild's pricing based on compute resources is considered cost-effective, particularly for serverless operations. Both platforms deliver a strong ROI by streamlining automation and reducing deployment times, with GitLab's full feature set often justifying its price for enterprises, while AWS CodeBuild provides a more budget-friendly solution for those within the AWS environment.

To learn more, read our detailed AWS CodeBuild vs. GitLab Report (Updated: September 2025).

AWS CodeBuild vs. GitLab

Download the complete report

Helped 867,370 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

AWS CodeBuild

Ranking in Build Automation

8th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

GitLab

Ranking in Build Automation

1st

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Security Tools (11th), Release Automation (2nd), Static Application Security Testing (SAST) (7th), Rapid Application Development Software (11th), Software Composition Analysis (SCA) (5th), Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (2nd), Fuzz Testing Tools (2nd), DevSecOps (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Build Automation category, the mindshare of AWS CodeBuild is 1.7%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of GitLab is 12.6%, down from 17.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Build Automation Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
GitLab	12.6%
AWS CodeBuild	1.7%
Other	85.7%

Build Automation

Featured Reviews

Mahadev Metre

DevOps Engineer at Paydoh

Integration with diverse environments boosts productivity and automation

AWS CodeBuild's support for a wide range of programming languages and build environments benefits development teams significantly in terms of productivity and ease of use. There are extensive libraries of code structures available, making it a universal pipeline. All programming languages I have worked with are supported in AWS CodeBuild, eliminating the need for alternative deployment services. The service supports iOS builds, Kotlin, Java, NodeJS, and ReactJS. AWS has made it accessible to all languages, allowing developers to simply open the console and trigger builds. AWS manages all the background server operations for building or deploying code. For standard builds such as ReactJS or Java, a Linux or Ubuntu server suffices. AWS provides its own operating system for these purposes. For builds requiring physical servers, such as Apple macOS server, AWS rents Mac minis specifically for iOS and SwiftUI builds. While this incurs higher charges, it demonstrates AWS's commitment to providing comprehensive solutions for all use cases.

Read full review

Rohit Kesharwani

Manager, Engineering at 7-Eleven

Improved agility and time to market with CI/CD enhancements

The CI/CD pipelines in GitLab are highly valuable. Another important feature is the single source of repository, allowing efficient repository management and source code management. GitLab provides manageability by allowing us to manage source code effectively through separate repositories. Additionally, GitLab enables the creation of individual CI/CD pipelines for each repository, making software more agile. By integrating GitLab as a DevOps platform, we have enhanced agility, improved our time to market, and different teams can work collaboratively on various projects.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The tool is used to build and test code. I find its biggest advantages are elasticity and reliability. We can easily assign as many computing resources as needed to build our code, which is much simpler than traditional methods that require server upgrades. It's a serverless tool, so it's very flexible and elastic."

"A valuable feature is the support for third-party repositories such as Bitbucket, GitLab, or GitHub."

"The initial setup of CodeBuild is easy."

"It works seamlessly with AWS Elastic Container Registry (ECR)."

"The integration with other AWS services has streamlined our workflow."

"The most important thing is that it's self-contained in an AWS account, and it's all linked to the customer's AWS account."

"The integration is a good feature."

"One of the main features I value in CodeBuild compared to previous experiences, like using Jenkins, is its ability to handle tasks automatically with AWS, requiring only proper setup of the check file."

More AWS CodeBuild pros

"It is very flexible and easy because you can store data on cloud."

"It is very useful for reviews. We are using branch merging operations and full reset operations. It is also very useful for merging our code and tracking another branch. The graph diagrams of Git are very useful. Its interface is straightforward and not too complex for us."

"I have had no problem with the stability of the solution."

"We like that we can create branches and then the branches can be reviewed and you can mesh those branches back. You can independently work with your own branch, you don't need to really control the core of other people."

"The important feature is the entire process of versioning source code maintenance and easy deployment. It is a necessity for the CI/CD pipeline."

"The solution's most valuable features are pipelines."

"The most valuable feature of GitLab is the automatic merging of code."

"GitLab has better support, and its features are superior compared to Jenkins."

More GitLab pros

Cons

"While working on building images for multiple applications within a single script, I encountered an issue where looping functionality was not supported as expected."

"One of the main challenges is that if the environment is not set up properly, it will result in issues such as image errors."

"The deployment fails sometimes."

"Notifications could be added, or SNS integration could be included so that notifications can be received on every build, whether the build fails or succeeds."

"The front-end interface and the management are somewhat challenging, and there's a lot of space for improvement."

"There is no persistent storage or preservation of workspace between the builds."

"They can further improve the integration of the Bitbucket for CodeBuild."

"Multiple clients have faced issues with pricing. After migrating from Azure to EC2, they were unexpectedly charged 100,000 rupees because the pricing details were not clearly visible."

More AWS CodeBuild cons

"We are having a few problems integrating with Jira at the moment, which is something that our IT department is investigating."

"GitLab's UI could be improved."

"The documentation could be improved to help newcomers better understand things like creating new branches."

"The documentation is confusing."

"I would like to see static analysis also embedded in GitLab. That would also help us. If there's something that it does internally by GitLab and then that is already tied up with your pipeline and then it can tell you that you're coding is good or your code is not great. Based on that, it would pass or fail. That should be streamlined. I would think that would help to a greater extent, in terms of having one solution rather than depending on multiple vendors."

"The pricing has been substantially increased, which is a major concern."

"There are missing search features, particularly when searching repositories or applying filters. Additionally, I have encountered issues with the deployment of CI/CD pipelines, especially dealing with variable environments."

"GitLab should work on improving their user interface for GitOps as it is lagging behind."

More GitLab cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We pay a monthly licensing fee."

"AWS CodeBuild is free. We only pay for our code's compute resources during the build process. For example, if our code takes ten minutes to build, we only pay for those ten minutes of computing time. CodeDeploy and CodePipeline are free because they're serverless and don't require computing resources. CodeCommit has minimal costs for storing code."

"Despite the cost, it is worth the investment."

"GitLab is cheap."

"I'm not sure if they have some kind of discount. I've been negotiating with them on prices before, and I believe they weren't too happy to give discounts, but list prices are $19 per user, per month for Premium and $99 per user, per month for Ultimate. So, the difference between Premium and Ultimate is a bit bigger, and in most companies, you need to build some type of business case."

"I think that we pay approximately $100 USD per month."

"The solution is based on a subscription model and is reasonably priced."

"This product is not very expensive but the price can be better."

"It is very expensive. We can't bear it now, and we have to find another solution. We have a yearly subscription in which we can increase the number of licenses, but we have to pay at the end of the year."

"As I work in a vast enterprise, I'm unsure about the licensing cost for GitLab. It's the management team that takes care of that."

"We are using its free version, and we are evaluating its Premium version. Its Ultimate version is very expensive."

More GitLab pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Build Automation solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

867,370 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

16%

Media Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Financial Services Firm

14%

Computer Software Company

13%

Government

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	6
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	2

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	35
Midsize Enterprise	9
Large Enterprise	42

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about AWS CodeBuild?

It works seamlessly with AWS Elastic Container Registry (ECR).

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AWS CodeBuild?

The cost structure is affordable for most builds except macOS servers. Standard builds can utilize AWS EC2 servers for background operations. However, macOS or iOS builds require physical servers m...

What needs improvement with AWS CodeBuild?

The servers used for macOS and iOS builds are limited in availability, operating only in US East 1 and East 2, and US West 1 and West 2. This geographical limitation causes latency issues and exten...

What do you like most about GitLab?

I find the features and version control history to be most valuable for our development workflow. These aspects provide us with a clear view of changes and help us manage requests efficiently.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for GitLab?

The pricing and cost are on par with other tools and are neither too expensive nor cheap.

What needs improvement with GitLab?

Regarding improvements, making task management is something that GitLab can potentially make easier, similar to what DevOps or Jira does.

GitHub Actions vs AWS CodeBuild

Comparisons

Compared 41% of the time

AWS CodePipeline vs AWS CodeBuild

Compared 25% of the time

Jenkins vs AWS CodeBuild

Compared 16% of the time

More AWS CodeBuild Competitors

Microsoft Azure DevOps vs GitLab

Compared 34% of the time

GitHub CoPilot vs GitLab

Compared 14% of the time

TeamCity vs GitLab

Compared 5% of the time

Tekton vs GitLab

Compared 5% of the time

SonarQube Server (formerly SonarQube) vs GitLab

Compared 4% of the time

More GitLab Competitors

Product Reports

AWS CodeBuild

Download AWS CodeBuild product report

Download GitLab product report

Also Known As

CodeBuild

Fuzzit

Overview

AWS CodeBuild is a fully managed continuous integration service that compiles source code, runs tests, and produces software packages that are ready to deploy. With CodeBuild, you don’t need to provision, manage, and scale your own build servers. CodeBuild scales continuously and processes multiple builds concurrently, so your builds are not left waiting in a queue. You can get started quickly by using prepackaged build environments, or you can create custom build environments that use your own build tools. With CodeBuild, you are charged by the minute for the compute resources you use.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

GitLab offers a secure and user-friendly platform for CI/CD pipeline management, code repository control, and collaboration, enhancing development speed and efficiency. It facilitates automation with extensive customization and tool integration, ideal for DevOps processes.

GitLab supports source code management, version control, and collaborative development. It's frequently used in CI/CD processes to automate builds and deployments while integrating DevOps practices. GitLab allows companies to manage repositories, automate pipelines, conduct code reviews, and maintain development lifecycles. The platform supports infrastructure and configuration management, enabling efficient code collaboration, deployment automation, and comprehensive repository handling. Many organizations commit and deploy developed code using GitLab's capabilities.

What are GitLab's most valuable features?

CI/CD Pipeline Management: Streamlines development through automated testing and deployment.
User-Friendly Interface: Ensures ease of collaboration and task automation.
Code Merging and Branching: Facilitates smooth code integration and version control.
Security Platform: Provides strong security features for safe development.
Tool Integration: Enhances functionality with diverse tool integration.

What benefits should users evaluate?

Development Speed: Accelerates processes through automation.
Collaboration Ease: Simplifies team interactions and workflow.
Customization Options: Offers extensive personalization for specific needs.
Comprehensive Documentation: Provides detailed guidance for users.
Secure Platform: Maintains integrity with robust security features.

In specific industries, GitLab serves as a backbone for source code management and CI/CD implementation. Companies leverage its capabilities for infrastructure management and deployment automation, thus streamlining project delivery timelines. Its ability to handle configuration management and code repositories effectively aids in maintaining development lifecycles, making it a preferred choice for organizations committed to enhancing their DevOps practices.

Sample Customers

Expedia, Intuit, Royal Dutch Shell, Brooks Brothers

1. NASA 2. IBM 3. Sony 4. Alibaba 5. CERN 6. Siemens 7. Volkswagen 8. ING 9. Ticketmaster 10. SpaceX 11. Adobe 12. Intuit 13. Autodesk 14. Rakuten 15. Unity Technologies 16. Pandora 17. Electronic Arts 18. Nordstrom 19. Verizon 20. Comcast 21. Philips 22. Deutsche Telekom 23. Orange 24. Fujitsu 25. Ericsson 26. Nokia 27. General Electric 28. Cisco 29. Accenture 30. Deloitte 31. PwC 32. KPMG

AWS CodeBuild vs. GitLab