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GitLab vs Harness comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 5, 2025

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

GitLab
Ranking in Build Automation
1st
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
7th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
85
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (10th), Release Automation (2nd), Rapid Application Development Software (11th), Software Composition Analysis (SCA) (5th), Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (2nd), Fuzz Testing Tools (2nd), DevSecOps (1st)
Harness
Ranking in Build Automation
10th
Ranking in Static Application Security Testing (SAST)
29th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Cost Management (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Build Automation category, the mindshare of GitLab is 15.0%, down from 18.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Harness is 7.5%, up from 4.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Build Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Rohit Kesharwani - PeerSpot reviewer
Improved agility and time to market with CI/CD enhancements
The CI/CD pipelines in GitLab ( /products/gitlab-reviews ) 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.
Linwei Yuan - PeerSpot reviewer
Streamline microservices deployment with integrated execution pipelines and comprehensive monitoring
Harness integrates all functions like execution pipelines, environment checks, and log monitoring in one place. It is very convenient since we have many microservices, so having one platform for all of them is beneficial. The dashboard allows me to monitor all core services' deployment status in one place, making it easier to find bugs and check logs.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of GitLab is the automatic merging of code."
"GitLab has better support, and its features are superior compared to Jenkins."
"I recommend GitLab for DevOps engineers."
"Everything is easy to configure and easy to work with."
"GitLab is very useful for pipelines, continuous integration, and continuous deployment. It is also stable."
"We like that we can have an all-encompassing product and don't have to implement different solutions."
"The merging feature makes it easy later on for the deployment."
"In terms of impact from using GitLab as an all-in-one DevOps platform, it helped with my project development life cycle."
"Harness integrates all functions like execution pipelines, environment checks, and log monitoring in one place, making it convenient."
"Harness integrates all functions like execution pipelines, environment checks, and log monitoring in one place."
"It's a highly customizable DevOps tool."
"Harness starts integrating with organizations, making everything automated without the need for manual interruption."
"The features of Harness are valuable, supporting rolling deployments, basic deployments, and blue-green deployments with zero downtime."
 

Cons

"You need to have a good knowledge of the product in order to use it."
"I would like more Agile features in the Premium version. The Premium version should have all Agile features that exist in the Ultimate version. IBM AOM has a complete Agile implementation, but in GitLab, you only have these features if you buy the Ultimate version. It would be good if we can use these in the Premium version."
"While GitLab is a great tool for developers, it lacks project planner features. Roadmaps and Gantt charts in GitLab are not as advanced as in Jira, and changing start and end dates is more laborious in GitLab."
"GitLab can improve the integration with third-party applications. It could be made easier. Additionally, having API control from my application could be helpful."
"I've noticed an area for improvement in GitLab, particularly needing to go through many steps to push the code to the repository. Resolving that issue would make the product better. My team quickly fixed it by writing a small script, then double-clicking or enabling the script to take care of the issue. However, that quick fix was from my team and not the GitLab team, so in the next release, if an automatic deployment feature would be available in GitLab, then that would be good because, in Visual Studio, you can do that with just one click of a button."
"As a partner, sometimes it's difficult to get support. They have a really complicated procedure for their support."
"I rate the support from GitLab a four out of five."
"The pricing model of GitLab is an issue for me."
"There's also room for improvement in debugging pipeline issues, which can sometimes become complex."
"I prefer the previous less compact UI version of Harness, which showed more details on the screen."
"When deploying multiple components to multiple environments, like production and BCP, failures sometimes occur. Improvements are needed when deploying one component to one environment."
"When integrating Harness with more than twenty applications in one place, it becomes less stable, causing improvements to be necessary."
"Even with automation, there's a requirement for manual change requests for approvals."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution's pricing is acceptable."
"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."
"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."
"GitLab is highly priced for smaller teams, but it's okay if considering a user base of thousands."
"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."
"My company uses the free version of GitLab, which is GitLab Community Edition. There is a licensed version also available for GitLab."
"We are using its free version, and we are evaluating its Premium version. Its Ultimate version is very expensive."
"There are different licensing options available, including a free limited-user license."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
32%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
7%
Retailer
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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?
One significant feature we lack is the configuration that enforces code reviews, which simplifies the development life cycle. Unfortunately, this is available only at a higher license level than we...
What do you like most about Harness?
It's a highly customizable DevOps tool.
What needs improvement with Harness?
When deploying multiple components to multiple environments, like production and BCP, failures sometimes occur. Improvements are needed when deploying one component to one environment.
What is your primary use case for Harness?
Our primary use case for Harness ( /products/harness-reviews ) is as a deployment tool. Although I am not a DevOps engineer, my team uses Harness ( /products/harness-reviews ) for deployment purpos...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Fuzzit
Armory
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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
Linedata, Openbank, Home Depot, Advanced
Find out what your peers are saying about GitLab vs. Harness and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
861,390 professionals have used our research since 2012.