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Microsoft Azure DevOps vs Polarion ALM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 15, 2024

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

Microsoft Azure DevOps
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
2nd
Ranking in Enterprise Agile Planning Tools
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
137
Ranking in other categories
Release Automation (1st)
Polarion ALM
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
5th
Ranking in Enterprise Agile Planning Tools
6th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category, the mindshare of Microsoft Azure DevOps is 10.3%, down from 19.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Polarion ALM is 6.1%, down from 7.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Azure DevOps10.3%
Polarion ALM6.1%
Other83.6%
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
 

Featured Reviews

Bharadwaj Deepak Mohapatra - PeerSpot reviewer
DevOps Engineer at ENTERPRISE SYSTEM SOLUTIONS LIMITED
Have built reliable end-to-end pipelines and streamlined cloud provisioning through consistent collaboration practices
I am currently working with open-source tools such as Jenkins for my main CI/CD pipeline, and for enterprise clients, I am using Microsoft Azure DevOps CI/CD pipeline. For other clients, I have also implemented CI/CD YAML pipelines through GitLab CI/CD workflow and GitHub Actions. I am creating the end-to-end CI/CD pipeline from development to deployment and monitoring all of this. Azure Boards is easier than Jira for my understanding because there are very easy points to manage the Agile methodology which we work on. Because it is a GUI, sometimes the process may take a few minutes more than the CLI process since the backend is running the exact CLI, but we are commanding through the GUI. There is definitely a time lag, but it is more secure. Microsoft Azure DevOps pipelines work very seamlessly rather than other CI/CD pipelines, as of my understanding. The downside is that the process may take more time when deploying some clusters, Kubernetes, Azure AKS service, or some vast microservice architecture deployments. There may be a little bit of lag I feel, though I cannot tell very strictly that this is a disadvantage, but sometimes it takes a little more time than other cloud infrastructures. All the major things are done by GUI, which is somewhat a little slow. However, if considering automations, process, monitoring, and provisioning, then it is the best cloud service across all the other service providers. Our implementation is a hybrid cloud. Microsoft Azure DevOps is definitely easily scalable. I have worked on many Kubernetes infrastructures and microservice deployments, and I have seen that replication is very good because it is very easy. The replication process is very straightforward. I definitely advocate for using less code because it is very time-consuming. If using GCP or Amazon Web Service, there is more interaction related to work over the CLI process. In terms of Microsoft Azure DevOps, there are many things done by the GUI, which is the best part.
LasseMikkonen - PeerSpot reviewer
CEO at byte
Has provided mature traceability and configuration features while supporting complex product development for mid-to-large companies
Polarion ALM can learn from Atlassian tools a lot, as the usability is not the best, and it is really narrowly focused on requirements management only. For example, if you want to do testing and test result management with it, it is very limited. Jama Connect has similar limitations, and both should really focus on developing the integrations and extendability. For example, Jama Connect does not even have an extension marketplace, whereas Polarion has a small one. However, compared to the Atlassian Marketplace where you can get whatever applications for whatever price, it is a totally different ballgame. I would highly recommend Polarion ALM add more AI features to it. I know they have started to do something, but for example, I have been developing widgets for IBM DOORS Next, AI widgets, so that you can write and analyze requirements with the AI, and I have also done the same for Jira, creating a couple of Jira applications in the marketplace as well.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Most of the features are very valuable for us, especially the source code control and task management."
"Managing a pipeline of deliverables became significantly easier with this solution."
"There has been a measurable improvement in productivity of around 40 to 50% after implementing Microsoft Azure DevOps, which has allowed more time to be spent on other things."
"The most valuable features of this solution are the CI/CD pipeline, and the testing automation."
"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."
"Azure Port is considered the most valuable feature."
"The initial setup is quick and easy."
"The initial setup process is easy."
"We had a nice experience with technical support."
"The software is stable."
"The best feature of Polarion ALM to me is its traceability link."
"The features I find the most valuable are requirement tracking and schematics."
"You can see the work ticket and you can circulate that within the teams. You can define your flows, customize according to your needs, and you can create dashboards and create the reports according to your needs."
"The tool helped us to more effectively and efficiently gather and structure the information (requirements, test plans, project management data, etc.), and share it with the involved stakeholders in a safe and change-controlled manner."
"Polarion ALM helps us better structure our customer requirements, and we can also validate the specs of our products against those. If anything changes on our side, we see the impact, and we can see the effect If a customer changes requirements."
"The technical support is quite good."
 

Cons

"I would like to see improvement in the metrics and the dependencies."
"The ability to integrate Microsoft Azure DevOps with other platforms and Microsoft products can be improved."
"With the query feature, we have to group items, so it becomes difficult for everyone to understand it. It's easier in JIRA, which has filters and other query options."
"The solution can be improved by having better integration with other cloud platforms."
"One thing I would note is that it's hard to know what is included or not in the product. Especially when you begin to try and compare it to other solutions. When you go to a site like VersionOne, they tell you Azure DevOps doesn't have this or that, and when you go to Microsoft, it says VersionOne doesn't have this or that. They could do a better job of laying out exactly what is on offer so customers know going in exactly what they'll get."
"With Microsoft, I would prefer to have more test plans. It's very difficult to find individual test plan module training."
"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."
"I can't think of anything I would like to improve, since I don't have complete knowledge of the platform yet. I'm sure that as I gain more experience, I will understand it better. The price could maybe be cheaper, but I'm sure I'll have more ideas as to improvements and additional features once I've used it more."
"We use PTC Windchill, and Polarion ALM doesn't have native integration, so we had to purchase the connector to integrate it with Polarion ALM. We still haven't implemented it."
"The user interface is not yet optimized."
"One of Polarion's shortcomings would be planning. It can handle plans, but the planning feature is very basic."
"The solution's editing capabilities need improvement."
"Test management lacks an automated process."
"The planning and task management aspects of the solution were not that easy."
"The solution can be improved by making it more user-friendly, and a server-based application rather than client based."
"As Polarion ALM is a development-oriented tool, easy support or easy access is provided by default, but if I want to use detailed features, I need to write the script, particularly the VM script, and this is its area for improvement. I want Polarion ALM to have a graphical user interface that doesn't need scripting. In the next release of the tool, I'd like for it to not require scripting and programming because needing to run script language is time-consuming."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution's deployment and licensing costs are very cheap compared to those of its competitors."
"There are additional costs for some functionality, such as increased scalability."
"Most of the things that we need and use are incorporated in the corporate solution — there are no additional costs."
"As a Microsoft Partner, you get a discount on the pricing. Licensing costs are around $80 a month for DevOps, but for Azure, it is about $200 a month."
"The pricing is very competitive because of the whole development cycle by Azure DevOps. You don't have to buy and integrate several different tools."
"Compared to other tools, Microsoft Azure DevOps is a cheap solution."
"There is a license for this solution."
"Its pricing is reasonable for the number of features that you get and the functionality that you can utilize for the agile delivery, which is what we are using it for. I found it extremely cost-effective."
"It is an expensive product."
"The license model is okay for large companies but would be quite expensive for smaller enterprises."
"The solution is expensive."
"Our license for Polarion ALM is yearly. And it's not the cheapest tool that we've looked at. So if we had made our decision purely based on the licensing cost, we wouldn't have selected Polarion."
"Software for medical devices is always expensive."
"If the pricing would come down and it was more affordable then we wouldn't have to switch."
"You have to pay around 50-60 euros per user."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
29%
Computer Software Company
10%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
4%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business42
Midsize Enterprise28
Large Enterprise69
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise12
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better - Jira or Microsoft Azure DevOps?
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 scalabl...
Which is better - TFS or Azure DevOps?
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 fri...
What do you like most about Microsoft Azure DevOps?
Valuable features for project management and tracking in Azure DevOps include a portal displaying test results, check-in/check-out activity, and developer/tester productivity.
What needs improvement with Polarion ALM?
Polarion ALM can learn from Atlassian tools a lot, as the usability is not the best, and it is really narrowly focused on requirements management only. For example, if you want to do testing and te...
What is your primary use case for Polarion ALM?
We are in our product development using Polarion ALM's functionalities. I am a power user, partly responsible for configuring the tool. We are using it for many things. The idea was to go for a req...
What advice do you have for others considering Polarion ALM?
The pricing of Polarion ALM and IBM ELM is pretty much aligned. They are not at the same level, but I would say aligned according to the capabilities of the tools, with DOORS being more expensive b...
 

Also Known As

Azure DevOps, VSTS, Visual Studio Team Services, MS Azure DevOps
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Alaska Airlines, Iberia Airlines, Columbia, Skype
Engineering Ingegneria Informatica, IBS AG, Zumtobel Group
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Azure DevOps vs. Polarion ALM and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.
882,410 professionals have used our research since 2012.