Chef vs Microsoft Azure DevOps comparison

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Chef Logo
Read 18 Chef reviews
629 views|436 comparisons
95% willing to recommend
Microsoft Logo
19,315 views|14,609 comparisons
95% willing to recommend
Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Chef and Microsoft Azure DevOps based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Release Automation solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
To learn more, read our detailed Chef vs. Microsoft Azure DevOps Report (Updated: March 2024).
768,740 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"The most important thing is it can handle a 100,000 servers at the same time easily with no time constraints.""This solution has improved my organization in the way that deployment has become very quick and orchestration is easy. If we have thousands of servers we can easily deploy in a small amount of time. We can deploy the applications or any kind of announcements in much less time.""I wanted to monitor a hybrid cloud environment, one using AWS and Azure. If I have to provision/orchestrate between multiple cloud platforms, I can use Chef as a one-stop solution, to broker between those cloud platforms and orchestrate around them, rather than going directly into each of the cloud-vendors' consoles.""Chef is a great tool for an automation person who wants to do configuration management with infrastructure as a code.""Chef can be scaled as needed. The Chef server itself can scale but it depends on the available resources. You can upgrade specific resources to meet the demand. Similarly, with clients, you can add as many clients as you need. Again, this depends on the server resources. If the server has enough resources, it can handle the number of servers required to manage the infrastructure. Chef can be scaled to meet the needs of the infrastructure being managed.""The most valuable feature is its easy configuration management, optimization abilities, complete infrastructure and application automation, and its superiority over other similar tools.""The most valuable feature is automation.""If you're handy enough with DSL and you can present your own front-facing interface to your developers, then you can actually have a lot more granular control with Chef in operations over what developers can perform and what they can't."

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"We use all the DevOps features and services, like reports, Boards, Pipelines, Artifactory, etc. The interface is interactive and intuitive. The platform visuals and workflow are straightforward in Azure DevOps.""The available Kanban board is the best feature for management decisions.""In Microsoft Azure DevOps, you have a one shop to get everything.""The installation is very straightforward.""My first impression of DevOps, after using Jira, is that it has a much better, more intuitive, and more user-friendly interface.""They have been lately adding features to the services on a regular basis. Every two weeks, they are adding functionality to Azure DevOps Services to match it with what Azure DevOps Server or on-prem would offer. So, we continue to get more robust functionality. My favorite right now is that they are starting to open up the API availability within Azure DevOps Services. Another thing that I like about Azure DevOps is that you can use it with any of the products that are on the market. You can integrate it with Jenkins and other open-source products to complete that fully functional CI, CD, CT, CM, and CS pipeline. It continues to enhance.""All of the features related to release management are very good.""It's a great product for the CI/CD process."

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Cons
"Chef could get better by being more widely available, adapting to different needs, and providing better documentation.""I would also like to see more analytics and reporting features. Currently, the analytics and reporting features are limited. I'll have to start building my own custom solution with Power BI or Tableau or something like that. If it came with built-in analytics and reporting features that would be great.""If they can improve their software to support Docker containers, it would be for the best.""Third-party innovations need improvement, and I would like to see more integration with other platforms.""I would like them to add database specific items, configuration items, and migration tools. Not necessarily on the builder side or the actual setup of the system, but more of a migration package for your different database sets, such as MongoDB, your extenders, etc. I want to see how that would function with a transition out to AWS for Aurora services and any of the RDBMS packages.""Vertical scalability is still good but the horizontal, adding more technologies, platforms, tools, integrations, Chef should take a look into that.""They could provide more features, so the recipes could be developed in a simpler and faster way. There is still a lot of room for improvement, providing better functionalities when creating recipes.""Support and pricing for Chef could be improved."

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"When comparing with Jira, I find that the task management capabilities in Azure DevOps are not yet fully comprehensive and should be enhanced.""Testing is very important. Microsoft Azure DevOps tests very well. However, DevOps teams need to be aware of what they are impacting when someone updates anything on the system.""It should be easier to manage Licenses especially because it's in the cloud.""Azure DevOps could be improved with more security plugins, especially for SaaS scanning and vulnerability scans.""The main issue that I have is the connection speed. Sometimes, the response is too slow. I am based in Taiwan, and I am not sure if it is because of broadband or something else. Its initial configuration is also a little bit difficult.""The tutorials for building pipelines are an area that is a bit technical for a beginner.""The solution could work to improve their reporting.""Azure DevOps is set up more for development and less for testing. If it is set up correctly, everyone can use it better, but it was set up from a development point of view, which means it is lacking in what I need from a testing perspective. Just like any other tool, it depends on how it is configured. I am not happy with the way it is set up. It is configured more from a development side, and it doesn't necessarily cater to all the other areas that probably need to use it, such as testing data, etc."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "When we're rolling out a new server, we're not using the AWS Marketplace AMI, we're using our own AMI, but we are paying them a licensing fee."
  • "The price per node is a little weird. It doesn't scale along with your organization. If you're truly utilizing Chef to its fullest, then the number of nodes which are being utilized in any particular day might scale or change based on your Auto Scaling groups. How do you keep track of that or audit it? Then, how do you appropriately license it? It's difficult."
  • "The price is always a problem. It is high. There is room for improvement. I do like purchasing on the AWS Marketplace, but I would like the ability to negotiate and have some flexibility in the pricing on it."
  • "Purchasing the solution from AWS Marketplace was a good experience. AWS's pricing is pretty in line with the product's regular pricing. Though instance-wise, AWS is not the cheapest in the market."
  • "We are able to save in development time, deployment time, and it makes it easier to manage the environments."
  • "We are using the free, open source version of the software, which we are happy with at this time."
  • "I wasn't involved in the purchasing, but I am pretty sure that we are happy with the current pricing and licensing since it never comes up."
  • "Pricing for Chef is high."
  • More Chef Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "It's a good tool, quite rich, it has a lot of features, and quite a lot of analytical capabilities which are built on top of it so that you can see how your projects are going and all that stuff. It's a good tool."
  • "There is a licensing fee of $6/user per month."
  • "The price is cheaper than Jira and some of the other competing tools."
  • "It is the least expensive product in this class."
  • "I find that the pricing is good, and it is competitive with the other vendors in the market."
  • "Microsoft Azure DevOps is free for up to five users and allows you to track a maximum of three projects."
  • "It is a subscription model and I only pay for what I use."
  • "The price of this solution is fair."
  • More Microsoft Azure DevOps Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:Chef is a great tool for an automation person who wants to do configuration management with infrastructure as a code.
    Top Answer:Chef does not support the containerized things of Chef products. In the future, Chef could develop a docker container or docker images.
    Top Answer:Jira is a great centralized tool for just about everything, from local team management to keeping track of products and work logs. It is easy to implement and navigate, and it is stable and scalable… more »
    Top Answer:TFS and Azure DevOps are different in many ways. TFS was designed for admins, and only offers incremental improvements. In addition, TFS seems complicated to use and I don’t think it has a very… more »
    Top Answer:The most valuable feature of the solution is task management.
    Ranking
    12th
    out of 32 in Release Automation
    Views
    629
    Comparisons
    436
    Reviews
    5
    Average Words per Review
    350
    Rating
    6.8
    1st
    out of 32 in Release Automation
    Views
    19,315
    Comparisons
    14,609
    Reviews
    22
    Average Words per Review
    650
    Rating
    8.2
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    Azure DevOps, VSTS, Visual Studio Team Services, MS Azure DevOps
    Learn More
    Overview

    Chef, is the leader in DevOps, driving collaboration through code to automate infrastructure, security, compliance and applications. Chef provides a single path to production making it faster and safer to add value to applications and meet the demands of the customer. Deployed broadly in production by the Global 5000 and used by more than half of the Fortune 500, Chef develops 100 percent of its software as open source under the Apache 2.0 license with no restrictions on its use. Chef Enterprise Automation Stack™, a commercial distribution, is developed solely from that open source code and unifies security, compliance, infrastructure and application automation with observability. Chef provides an unequaled developer experience for the Coded Enterprise by enabling users to express infrastructure, security policies and the application lifecycle as code, modernizing development, packaging and delivery of any application to any platform. For more information, visit http://chef.io and follow @chef.

    Microsoft Azure DevOps is a cloud service that enables developers to collaborate on code development projects and create and deploy applications quicker than ever before. The service helps unite developers, project managers, and software development experts through a collaborative experience while using the application. For the users' convenience, Azure DevOps offers the user cloud services through Azure DevOps Services or an on-premises service using Azure DevOps Server. In addition, it supports integration with additional services and adding extensions, including the ability for the user to create their own custom extensions. 

    Azure DevOps provides a variety of unified features that can be accessed through their web browser or IDE client, such as:

    • Azure Pipelines - Develop and deploy services to support ongoing application integration and delivery. Azure pipelines, which work with almost every project type and most languages, will automatically test code projects in order to make them available to others.

    • Azure Artifacts - Share packages and integrate package sharing between teams. Packages include NuGet, npm, and Maven, in addition to other private and public sources. Developers can now share and consume packages with other developers from different public registries.

    • Azure Repos - Offers source control of your code through Team Foundation Version Control (TFVC) or Git repositories. Developers can now keep track of any changes that are made in their code over the course of their project.

    • Azure Test Plans - Offers continuous and manual/exploratory app testing through several tools. Test Suites, or a collection of Test Cases, are grouped together in a container called a Test Plan.

    • Azure Boards - Provides a suite of Agile tools to track work, support planning, code defects, and general issues while using Kanban and Scrum software. Teams are in need of tools that are flexible and will help them grow. Azure Boards is a service that helps developers manage their software projects. 

    Benefits of Microsoft Azure DevOps

    Microsoft Azure DevOps offers many benefits, including:

    • A quick setup and easy deployment
    • An elastic scale
    • Exceptional security
    • No-maintenance operations
    • Effortless collaboration through domains
    • The ability to create and deploy products faster than traditional software

    Reviews from Real Users

    Microsoft Azure DevOps stands out among its competitors for a variety of reasons. Two major ones are its ability to forecast how long each task will take and the ability for users to follow the entire development process.

    PeerSpot viewers note the effectiveness of this solution. An executive chief operating officer for a cloud provider notes, “We can forecast tasks and the number of hours a task will take and can compare it with how long a task actually takes.” 

    Carlos H., a product and system director at SPCM, writes, “I think the most usable thing is that you can follow the whole progress of the development process. This makes it very useful for us.”

    Sample Customers
    Facebook, Standard Bank, GE Capital, Nordstrom, Optum, Barclays, IGN, General Motors, Scholastic, Riot Games, NCR, Gap
    Alaska Airlines, Iberia Airlines, Columbia, Skype
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Computer Software Company30%
    Comms Service Provider20%
    Non Tech Company10%
    Legal Firm10%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Financial Services Firm21%
    Computer Software Company13%
    Manufacturing Company8%
    Government8%
    REVIEWERS
    Computer Software Company23%
    Financial Services Firm15%
    Energy/Utilities Company11%
    Manufacturing Company8%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company13%
    Manufacturing Company11%
    Financial Services Firm11%
    Government9%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business5%
    Midsize Enterprise35%
    Large Enterprise60%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business19%
    Midsize Enterprise11%
    Large Enterprise70%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business31%
    Midsize Enterprise18%
    Large Enterprise51%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business18%
    Midsize Enterprise14%
    Large Enterprise68%
    Buyer's Guide
    Chef vs. Microsoft Azure DevOps
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about Chef vs. Microsoft Azure DevOps and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
    768,740 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Chef is ranked 12th in Release Automation with 18 reviews while Microsoft Azure DevOps is ranked 1st in Release Automation with 124 reviews. Chef is rated 8.0, while Microsoft Azure DevOps is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Chef writes "Useful for large infrastructure, reliable, but steep learning cureve". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Microsoft Azure DevOps writes "Good support, helpful management capabilities, and great Kanban boards". Chef is most compared with Jenkins, AWS Systems Manager, Microsoft Configuration Manager, BigFix and SaltStack, whereas Microsoft Azure DevOps is most compared with GitLab, Jira, TFS, Rally Software and ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management. See our Chef vs. Microsoft Azure DevOps report.

    See our list of best Release Automation vendors.

    We monitor all Release Automation reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.