Microsoft Azure DevOps vs Rally Software comparison

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25,110 views|19,203 comparisons
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8,518 views|3,687 comparisons
91% willing to recommend
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Executive Summary

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

Find out in this report how the two Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
To learn more, read our detailed Microsoft Azure DevOps vs. Rally Software Report (Updated: March 2024).
768,857 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 solution is easy to implement and easy to use.""Detailed logs allow us to pinpoint the exact cause of any issues, making troubleshooting efficient and accurate.""Provides us with user histories.""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.""We can forecast tasks and the number of hours a task will take and can compare it with how long a task actually takes.""Azure DevOps is effective for repository management and code collaboration. We can create branches, differentiate between code versions, save and review code later, get PR approvals, and more. All these features are valuable.""The simplicity and ease of use are two features that we have found to be most valuable.""Our technical sales staff and business development people need to know how far the developers are on any product that we're developing. DevOps makes it easier for you to see how far along they are with the work because they have a repository where they store everything. There is a portal where you can see what has been done, what has been tested, what is working, and what isn't. I have a huge dashboard with an overview of what the development team is doing from an executive point of view."

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"When we went into Scaled Agile Framework, we could not have done it without the use of Agile Central. It allows us to scale our Scrum teams, and it also enables us when we do our remote big room plannings.""Ease of use - I don't even know when a new release is coming and I don't need to because it's so easy to use what's new.""CA Agile Central provides visibility into how teams are meeting business objectives.""It's a good platform to keep track of all the user stories across all projects. So rather than having one off Excel spreadsheets with all of the requirements, it is a good place to have all of that.""The most valuable feature is actually creating a field within there for architectural review. So when teams are struggling or have questions on the architecture or strategy that they take, they can actually flag that particular story, release, or project. Those can then be reviewed by the architecture team and the teams actually get additional information on how to course-correct, build on the architecture that we're trying to build throughout the organization, and get over road blocks much quicker.""The most useful part is how it breaks down tasks into parents and children, manageable tasks. It has a whole project as an initiative, and then it breaks it down further and further. And then you get to actual user stories and tasks that you can sit and develop.""Reporting is much easier and faster than Micro Focus ALM, with CA AC built on web services... Also, the data is more granular when it comes to tasks, iterations, sprints, and releases.""When it comes to the valuable features of Rally Software, it excels at burn-down charts, burn-up charts, and road mapping once it's set up. I particularly appreciated the new feature for releases and road mapping, which worked exceptionally well."

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Cons
"Its setup is quite complex.""I would like to see a bit more project tracking.""The UI, the user experience, is challenging for newcomers.""Reporting could be better. We would like to see how many applications are onboarded in DevOps and in which phase they are. We would like to know for how many applications we have done only the repository, but we have not yet done the build pipeline or deploy pipeline. Currently, there is no such report. We have to figure it out ourselves. There is no way to check how many applications are completing their build pipelines, how many applications are completing their deploy pipeline, how many are ready to use, and how many pipelines are working.""The active directory password system needs some improvement because many times the password for the active directory expires before the set time.""It should have security features for scanning the code and checking it for vulnerability and security. Currently, I am using other tools for this. It should also have integration with other tools to improve security.""The communication could work better, especially for the development team.""The testing environment and different pipelining concepts can be improved."

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"The product needs to have more integration capabilities.""Customization features may not be exposed or unavailable, so people may be looking for them. So, customization is an area people have told me is more desirable.""It could improve by being self-organizing: user stories, different hierarchies, and different perspectives. Not just as a single hierarchical structure, but something that can be multidimensional.""There are few customisation options. For instance, the workflow for story cards cannot be changed out of the box from the standard (Defined, In-Progress, Completed and Accepted).""What I don't like about it is that it is really hard to find old work to reference information and use the reporting section of the application in terms of trying to analyze trends. If I am trying to find out which interfaces took this long and I want to compare and measure improvement from one quarter to another quarter, the reporting mechanism within Rally is very troublesome. They have an Excel plugin that you're supposed to use, but you literally have to pull the raw data out before you can do the analysis. You can't do it within Rally, and if you can, it is a secret, and I don't know how to do it. It should have better, easier, and user-friendly reporting without having to use the Excel add-in. It is very clunky. There is a lot of data in there, but it is not organized in such a way that makes it intuitive. You really have to kind of look for where do you put your documentation or dates. Some customization is available, but it is not plug-and-play like Jira. When I switched from TFS to Jira, I just went and started using Jira, whereas with Rally, you kind of have to really get in and figure out what you need to do before you set stuff up, or you're going to get yourself stuck. You can just start using Jira and be successful.""The Reporting feature can improve, especially around executive summaries and dependency mapping.""The stronger CA can get on dependency mapping the better. That's the biggest hiccup. As you're setting up your features, ​they should make it easier to flag the dependencies, either across features or across projects. Then you're more set up for success.""We want Rally to generate OKRs, to allow teams to record the OKRs, and then the OKRs can be mapped to the epics and there is organizational alignment."

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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 →

  • "Frankly, pricing is expensive and needs to be carefully planned for when budgeting."
  • "The license costs are fairly high as compared to some of the other solutions out there."
  • "From a price point, it's a cost effective solution for our needs."
  • "It is expensive and may not be worthwhile for a small company."
  • "We are always looking for a discount, if the solution was less expensive it would be a benefit."
  • "I understand it's a little more expensive. That is why many people prefer Jira."
  • "Rally Software costs $50 a month, and for a base account, that price is acceptable."
  • More Rally Software Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    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.
    Top Answer: We have teams come and go all the time. We have teams in India, America, Ireland, Poland, Italy, England... we are spread out everywhere! Rally is our key tool for scrum planning and our single… more »
    Top Answer:Rally Software costs $50 a month, and for a base account, that price is acceptable.
    Top Answer:It is hard to track the changes. For example, we're in sprint 25, and then we have 26, 27, 28, and 29. Throughout that whole time, we're developing pipelines in Azure, moving to GitHub, creating… more »
    Ranking
    Views
    25,110
    Comparisons
    19,203
    Reviews
    22
    Average Words per Review
    650
    Rating
    8.2
    Views
    8,518
    Comparisons
    3,687
    Reviews
    5
    Average Words per Review
    767
    Rating
    8.4
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    Azure DevOps, VSTS, Visual Studio Team Services, MS Azure DevOps
    CA Agile Central, Rally Enterprise, CA Agile Training, CA Agile Coaching, CA Agile Academy, CA Agile Management , CA ALM
    Learn More
    Overview

    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.”

    With Rally Software, you can plan, prioritize, manage, track, and continuously improve your work so that you can deliver the value that your customers need with speed, quality, and efficiency. Our enterprise-class Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) SaaS platform provides visibility into progress, roadblocks, and dependencies across multiple teams, projects, and programs. This allows you to align to your strategic goals and create better business results, and to do it all in a single system of record.

    Sample Customers
    Alaska Airlines, Iberia Airlines, Columbia, Skype
    Physicians Mutual, Harvard Pilgrim HealthCare, Editora Abril, Tata Communications, Level 3 Communications, Seagate, TomTom, Philips, Hiscox, Physicians Mutual, MYOB
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Computer Software Company23%
    Financial Services Firm15%
    Energy/Utilities Company11%
    Manufacturing Company8%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company13%
    Manufacturing Company11%
    Financial Services Firm11%
    Government9%
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm19%
    Healthcare Company17%
    Comms Service Provider15%
    Manufacturing Company10%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization78%
    Financial Services Firm3%
    Manufacturing Company3%
    Healthcare Company3%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business31%
    Midsize Enterprise18%
    Large Enterprise51%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business18%
    Midsize Enterprise14%
    Large Enterprise68%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business10%
    Midsize Enterprise10%
    Large Enterprise80%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business3%
    Midsize Enterprise80%
    Large Enterprise17%
    Buyer's Guide
    Microsoft Azure DevOps vs. Rally Software
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Azure DevOps vs. Rally Software and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
    768,857 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Microsoft Azure DevOps is ranked 1st in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites with 124 reviews while Rally Software is ranked 8th in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites with 116 reviews. Microsoft Azure DevOps is rated 8.2, while Rally Software is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Microsoft Azure DevOps writes "Good support, helpful management capabilities, and great Kanban boards". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Rally Software writes "A solution that enables users to accurately estimate the time required for building large software projects". Microsoft Azure DevOps is most compared with GitLab, Jira, TFS, ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management and OpenText ALM / Quality Center, whereas Rally Software is most compared with Jira, TFS, Jira Align, OpenText ALM / Quality Center and Digital.ai Agility. See our Microsoft Azure DevOps vs. Rally Software report.

    See our list of best Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites vendors and best Enterprise Agile Planning Tools vendors.

    We monitor all Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites 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.