Digital.ai Release vs GitLab vs Jenkins comparison

Read 91 GitLab reviews

18,296 Views
3,659 Comparison Views

97% willing to recommend

Read 92 Jenkins reviews

4,645 Views
4,506 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

Digital.ai Release

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Digital.ai Release, GitLab, and Jenkins based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about GitLab, Google, GitHub and others in Build Automation.

To learn more, read our detailed Build Automation Report (Updated: March 2026).

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Build Automation

March 2026

Helped 886,719 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:

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Build Automation category, the mindshare of Digital.ai Release is 2.6%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of GitLab is 7.7%, down from 16.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Jenkins is 7.7%, down from 10.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Build Automation Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
GitLab	7.7%
Jenkins	7.7%
Digital.ai Release	2.6%
Other	82.0%

Build Automation

Featured Reviews

Jeanne-Mari Chandran

Software Configuration Specialist at a insurance company with 10,001+ employees

Experience seamless project management and integration with robust tools

The features I find most valuable in Digital.ai Release are the integration with MS Teams, because we have MS Teams channels that publish or push notifications to that. When we start deployments, it sends a notification to the people that we are doing a deployment to their environment. It notifies them when the deployment is started, completed, or if attention is required. I also appreciate the fact that it has plugins for Bamboo and I use lots of Gradle and JSON scripts, and we do SQL upgrades as well, triggering Flyway scripts via Bamboo, along with the integration with XLD and Jira; it's all Atlassian software. Regarding environment management capabilities, Digital.ai Release is mostly useful for me, as it is more application related and that is managed via my XLD dictionary. We have one artifact that is environment agnostic, which has placeholders that correspond to my XLD keys and values, and at deployment time, it substitutes the placeholders with those environment specific values. We don't need to make a specific deployment artifact for dev, test, or production; it is all the same artifact using environment variables, ensuring what we take to production is what was tested.

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BasilJiji

System Engineer at a retailer with 10,001+ employees

Role-based workflows have transformed daily deployments and improve team collaboration

GitLab has role-based access control, so when a team member needs to make a code change, they cannot directly apply it to the environment but must put in a merge request. Once a senior reviews the code and approves it, then it is implemented across the environment, making it safer and allowing everyone to experience the process. The best features GitLab offers are version control and automation, which are the major things that stand out to me. When it comes to access, the login is very smooth, with just one login integrated with our Okta, allowing everyone to log in easily. Deployments become much easier, and that is how GitLab helps. The automation features make my work easier because we use a tool called AWX, which is connected to GitLab. Whenever we run a job on AWX, it directly checks the code and uses it. Since the code is not preserved locally but kept in the cloud, it is safe and nobody can tamper with it. When it comes to safety, that is a major thing. Automation features allow the code to be accessed from any tools we use, so the jobs we run are helping tremendously and doing their work perfectly. For pipeline tasks, we have created a significant amount of pipelines, which are all hosted in GitLab. Running the pipelines has become much easier, and they are doing a perfect job, helping tremendously in our day-to-day activities. GitLab has positively impacted my organization because previously we stored code locally on servers, leading to many risks. Since GitLab came into our environment, our integration and deployments became much easier, helping our work become much smoother. Improvements from GitLab have led to better team collaboration because when several people are working, they can all edit the code and submit it as a merge request, and once approved, it reflects directly to the main branch. Many can work at the same time. When it comes to deployments, deploying has become much faster since we started using GitLab, and even if errors occur, we can spot them easily and troubleshoot, which has helped tremendously.

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Mahdi Mallaki

Senior Devops Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees

Has a community of plugin providers but needs improvement in Kubernetes integration

Integrating Jenkins with other tools or solutions has presented some challenges. For instance, when attempting to integrate Jenkins with Kubernetes, I encountered numerous errors, which took several days to resolve. In Jenkins, adding a feature typically involves incorporating the repository feature separately. Jenkins lacks built-in Git repository functionality, necessitating an external Git repository to store Jenkins manifests. In contrast, GitLab offers an integrated Git repository and pipeline runner, streamlining the process. One improvement for Jenkins could be integrating a Git server, simplifying the management of CI/CD pipelines. Currently, with Jenkins, modifying pipeline manifests requires navigating to a separate Git repository. In GitLab, however, manifest changes can be made directly within the repository.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Overall, it's been a good experience."

"The solution can apply one template across multiple applications."

"The time is also reduced because the manual work has tremendously decreased. We just have to click one button, and it will create everything for us."

"The most valuable feature of Digital.ai Release is its ability to communicate with various deployment systems, such as XLD and batch deployments, as well as integrate with tools, such as Flyway and Bamboo. We use Bamboo as our build orchestrator, and Digital.ai Release also integrates with Jira, another Atlassian solution. These capabilities make it a powerful tool for managing workflow, test automation, and other processes."

"Since using Digital.ai Release, time has been saved, money has been saved, and staffing requirements have been reduced."

"The orchestration, building the release, and then just executing it and managing that pipeline — the orchestration capabilities are great for that."

"Overall, I would give Digital.ai Release a rating of nine out of ten; there's always room for improvement, but it's really good."

"Everything is easy to configure and easy to work with."

"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."

"CI/CD is valuable for me."

"We like the automatic deployment for different environments."

"The solution's most valuable feature is that it is compatible with GitHub. The product's integration capabilities are sufficient for our small company of 35 people."

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

"GitLab's best features are continuous integration and fast deployment."

"The most valuable feature of GitLab is its convenience. I am able to trace back most of my changes up to a far distance in time and it helps me to analyze and see the older version of the code."

More GitLab pros

"I love Jenkins. I like that you work on anything, and you make anything. Jenkins is very important for my team. I am satisfied with the product."

"Jenkins is the most widely used development tool, so there are many plugins and it's easy to integrate."

"This is a great integration tool and very powerful."

"Other than that, we're very happy with the product."

"Jenkins is a very good tool, which I highly recommend, and it's very helpful for the continuous integration of any products."

"The most valuable feature of Jenkins is its open source."

"Jenkins has a lot of built-in packages and tools."

"The auto-schedule feature is valuable. Another valuable feature is that Jenkins does not trigger a build when there is no change in any of the systems. Jenkins also supports most of the open-source plug-ins."

More Jenkins pros

Cons

"The backfill could be improved, we could automate that. Right now it's subjective — it's up to the lead developer's memory to remember to backfill."

"The solution is a little bit expensive."

"Overall, the price is just too high; especially considering we're in the middle of a pandemic."

"Currently, we put artifact details manually. What we could improve, in our case, is the deployment instruction base. Developers input all the information, including which artifact and where it needs to be deployed. What Digital.ai could do is automatically go to the deployment instruction page, take those artifact details, and implement them."

"Digital.ai Release could improve by having a better plugin that works with Guardian that we use for mainframe migrations. If there could be an interface or plugin for Guardian that would be beneficial."

"One improvement for Digital.ai Release could be to simplify the user interface for beginners."

"I would like to improve Digital.ai Release by exploring its cloud capabilities as we are currently in the middle of migrating to the cloud, but I actually have no idea what Digital.ai's cloud capabilities are."

"The solution should be more cloud-native and have more cloud-native capabilities and features."

"I have encountered issues with the deployment of CI/CD pipelines, especially dealing with variable environments."

"GitLab could add a plugin to integrate with Kubernetes stuff."

"I believe GitLab can be improved by making integration with other platforms a little easier."

"GitLab's Windows version is yet not available and having this would be an improvement."

"In the next release, I would like to see GitLab expand its integration capabilities to include platforms like DigitalOcean, which developers widely use for cloud infrastructure. Enhancing CI/CD automation features specifically tailored for DigitalOcean would be beneficial."

"The licensing model could be improved to be more accommodating in terms of user numbers and costs."

"I don't really like the new way because it is pretty focused on the on-premise environment, but we're in a hybrid environment."

More GitLab cons

"The user interface could be improved, and its reporting capabilities need enhancement. The plugins could be more effective."

"Creating a new SonarQube project requires a separate job, and we've encountered some integration issues with Docker and the need for better vulnerability checks."

"The product should provide more visualization as to how many pipelines are performing and how many builds are happening. It should also integrate with Kubernetes and OpenShift."

"It would help if they offered more integrations."

"It is not always easy to control the permissions for each user."

"The UI must be more user-friendly."

"The solution could improve by having more advanced integrations."

"Jenkins can improve by continuing to add additional plugins for all the new solutions that are coming out within the cloud sphere."

More Jenkins cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Overall, the price is just too high; especially considering we're in the middle of a pandemic."

"The solution's license includes all features."

"We are currently using the open-source version."

"GitLab is cheap."

"We are using the free version of GitLab."

"The solution's standard license is paid annually. They have changed the pricing model and it used to be better. There is a free version available."

"The initial setup cost is excellent and you can add the premium features later."

"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."

"I'm not aware of the licensing costs because those were covered by the customer."

"In terms of the pricing for GitLab, on a scale of one to five, with one being expensive and five being cheap, I'm rating pricing for the solution a four. It could still be cheaper because right now, my company has a small team, and sometimes it's difficult to use a paid product for a small team. You'd hope the team will grow and scale, but currently, you're paying a high license fee for a small team. I'm referring to the GitLab license that has premium features and will give you all features. This can be a problem for management to approve the high price of the license for a team this small."

More GitLab pricing and cost advice

"Jenkins is open source."

"This is an open-source solution for the basic features. However, if an organization wishes to include specific functionality, outside of the basic package, there are extra costs involved."

"The solution is open source."

"Some of the add-ons are too expensive."

"We are using the freeware version of Jenkins."

"The tool is open-source."

"Jenkins is an open-source platform."

"Jenkins is open source and free."

More Jenkins pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

33%

Computer Software Company

10%

Insurance Company

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

15%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Computer Software Company

10%

Government

10%

Financial Services Firm

19%

Manufacturing Company

13%

Computer Software Company

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	2
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	4

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	37
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	46

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	28
Midsize Enterprise	15
Large Enterprise	57

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Digital.ai Release ?

The time is also reduced because the manual work has tremendously decreased. We just have to click one button, and it...

What needs improvement with Digital.ai Release ?

Based on my experience, I would like to improve Digital.ai Release by exploring its cloud capabilities as we are curr...

What is your primary use case for Digital.ai Release ?

My use case for Digital.ai Release is that I work for an insurance company on a very big project that develops multip...

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 provi...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for GitLab?

The setup cost for GitLab is minimal since the team has its own minimal resource balancing. The costing falls into an...

What needs improvement with GitLab?

There are many improvements that GitLab can implement, such as addressing the issue of caching. Currently, when I hav...

How does Tekton compare with Jenkins?

When you are evaluating tools for automating your own GitOps-based CI/CD workflow, it is important to keep your requi...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Jenkins?

Jenkins is used in many companies to save money, especially within R&D divisions, by avoiding the expenses of pro...

What needs improvement with Jenkins?

I do not have any notes for improvement.

Endor Labs vs Digital.ai Release

Comparisons

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Compared 6% of the time

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Compared 6% of the time

Microsoft Azure DevOps vs Digital.ai Release

Compared 5% of the time

Bamboo vs Digital.ai Release

Compared 4% of the time

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Compared 46% of the time

Tekton vs GitLab

Compared 2% of the time

TeamCity vs GitLab

Compared 2% of the time

SonarQube vs GitLab

Compared 2% of the time

Veracode vs GitLab

Compared 2% of the time

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Compared 6% of the time

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Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 4% of the time

VMware Tanzu Platform vs Jenkins

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Download Digital.ai Release product report

Digital.ai Release

April 2026

Download GitLab product report

April 2026

Download Jenkins product report

April 2026

Also Known As

XL Release, XebiaLabs XL Release

Fuzzit

No data available

Overview

Automate, orchestrate, and gain visibility into your release pipelines at scale using Digital.ai Release, a release management tool that is designed for enterprises. Control and track releases, standardize processes, and bake compliance and security into your software release pipelines.

Digital.ai

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.

Jenkins is an award-winning application that monitors executions of repeated jobs, such as building a software project or jobs run by cron.