27 Of The Best CI/CD Tools Available Today

27 Of The Best CI/CD Tools Available Today

Continuous Integration (CI) and Continuous Delivery (CD) (or CI/CD) has become an integral part of software development and DevOps testing. It provides developers the necessary features so that they can deploy the code continuously. It detects bugs at an early stage and avoids integration problems due to frequent committing of source code. With so many CI/CD tools available in the market, it becomes essential to choose the best CI/CD tools that suit the budget and project requirements. To make it easy for you, we have created this list, which we hope will help you choose the best CI/CD tool.

1. Jenkins

Jenkins is a Java-based cross platform, open-source CI/CD tool. It offers continuous integration, along with facilitating continuous delivery. It also enables real-time testing and reporting. Jenkins can be installed by just downloading its executable in the .war format and starting the same from the terminal.

Jenkins Pipeline provides a set of tools that can be used for modeling delivery pipelines ‘as code.’ Jenkins implements the pipeline using DSL (Domain Specific Language). It is one of the widely used and best CI/CD tools as it is open-source and has existed for a long time.

Salient features of Jenkins

  1. Available for Windows, Linux, and macOS platforms.
  2. Free and open-source hence, it is preferable for startups as well as large-scale organizations.
  3. 16.3K Star & 6.5k Forked Repo on GitHub.
  4. Highly extensible.
  5. It has a thriving plugin ecosystem (1500+ plugins) and a best-in-class community.
  6. Integrates with popular cloud platforms such as AWS, Google Cloud, Azure, Digital Ocean, and more.
  7. Can be leveraged for performing work in parallel and realizing complex CD requirements.
  8. The installer in the .war format that is a stand-alone Java application and works out of the box.

2. TeamCity

TeamCity is a server based CI/CD pipeline tool in Java. It is developed and maintained by JetBrains, the company behind the development of several useful tools like PyCharm, IntelliJ Idea, and more. It is available for installation on Windows and Linux Servers.

TeamCity is free to use for open-source projects and offers small teams an easy option to integrate with Azure DevOps and Jira Software Cloud. It also supports launching build agents in the Kubernetes cluster.

Salient features of TeamCity

  1. Highly extensible and can be customized for reusing settings of a project to the sub-project.
  2. It can run parallel builds, thereby providing the flexibility to run builds simultaneously on different builds and environments.
  3. Pipelines in TeamCity are defined using Kotlin-based DSL (Domain Specific Language).
  4. Integrates with Docker, Visual Studio Team Services, Maven, NuGet, and more.
  5. Its on-premise variant integrates with popular cloud platforms like Google Cloud, AWS, VMWare vSphere, and more.
  6. It provides powerful features that enable running history, viewing test progress (and history) reports on-the-fly, and adding builds to favorites.

3. CircleCI

CircleCI is one of the best CI/CD tools that is suited for realizing CI/CD for open-source projects and large-scale projects. CircleCI Cloud is its cloud-based offering whereas CircleCI Server is its on-premise (or self-hosted) solution.

It supports languages that can be built on Windows, Linux, and macOS platforms. It is easy to set up and uses a proprietary YAML syntax for its pipelines. In 2019, Forrester Wave named CircleCI as a leader in Cloud Native continuous integration.

Salient features of CircleCI

  1. Easy to set up and can be used with popular version-controlling systems like GitHub, Bitbucket, and more.
  2. It offers CI/CD pipelines as ‘Workflows.’
  3. It supports the majority of the popular programming languages out of the box.
  4. For reducing the build time, builds can be split and balanced across multiple containers.
  5. Parallel testing in CircleCI helps in running tests in parallel across different executors.
  6. Tests can be separated using timing data that further helps in reducing the time involved in test execution.
  7. CircleCI Server, which is CircleCI’s on-premise offering, can be integrated with popular third-party tools like GitHub Enterprise, LambdaTest, Coveralls, and more.
  8. CircleCI Server supports widely-used cloud platforms like AWS, Google Cloud, Azure, and more.
  9. CircleCI Orbs, which are reusable snippets of code, help in automating repetitive processes and accelerating the integration with third-party tools.

4. Travis CI

Like Jenkins, Travis CI is also one of the early movers in the CI/CD pipeline tools market. It was initially rolled-out only for open-source projects and later migrated to support closed-source projects as well.

Written in the Ruby programming language, Travis CI is one of the best CI/CD tools for open-source & enterprise-level projects, if your projects are in GitHub or Bitbucket. Like CircleCI, Travis CI also has different offerings for the open-source community and enterprises that intend to use Travis CI on their private Cloud (or self-hosted platform).

Salient features of Travis CI

  1. Travis CI supports a whole range of programming languages (i.e., a total of 30 in number), including Java, C#, Julia, Python, and more.
  2. Enterprises looking for more privacy and secured solutions can opt for Travis CI Enterprise, a self-hosted tool that offers seamless integration with GitHub and Bitbucket.
  3. CI/CD pipelines use a proprietary YAML syntax, with seamless integration with GitHub Enterprise tools.
  4. You can use the Cloud (or SaaS) variant of Travis CI for open-source projects and enterprises with small team sizes.
  5. It provides runtimes on popular platforms like Linux, macOS, and Windows.
  6. The build matrix feature in Travis CI lets you perform parallel builds on a range of combinations comprising different environments, languages, and runtimes.
  7. Travis CI Enterprise supports integration with popular cloud platforms like AWS, Google Cloud, Kubernetes, Azure, and more.
  8. Integration with a cross-browser testing tool like LambdaTest helps perform testing across different combinations of browsers, platforms, and devices (emulators).

Comparing The Best CI/CD Tools: CircleCI vs Travis CI

5. Bamboo

Bamboo is a popular tool for Continuous Integration (CI). It is an enterprise product developed by Atlassian, the organization behind the creation of Jira that provides the facility for performing builds, tests, and releases in a single window.

It only works seamlessly with Jira but also works with popular SCM tools like Bitbucket. It is available for deployment on popular platforms like Windows, Linux, and macOS. Like other popular CI/CD pipeline tools, Bamboo also supports many programming languages, along with technologies like AWS, SVN, Git, and more.

Salient Features of Bamboo

  1. Bamboo offers seamless migration from an open-source CI/CD option like Jenkins to its platform.
  2. It has built-in integration with Jira Software and Bitbucket server.
  3. Bamboo can integrate with popular tools (or platforms) like Docker, AWS, and more.
  4. It can realize parallel builds by executing builds on remote build agents. It can support up to 100 remote build agents and parallel test batches on the agents.
  5. Bamboo is available in self-hosted and cloud-based variants.
  6. Based on changes in the repository, Bamboo can trigger the builds, and you can subsequently send push-notifications from Bitbucket.

6. GoCD

GoCD is an open-source Continuous Integration server from the folks at Thoughtworks. In comparison to the other CI/CD DevOps tools, its major differentiator is the Value Stream Map (VSM) feature. VSM is a full end-to-end view across pipelines, and it successfully maps it to the concept of ‘Deployment Pipeline’ or ‘Continuous Delivery Pipeline.’

The provision to chain pipelines helps in reducing the interdependence between teams.

Salient features of GoCD

  1. It is easy to configure dependencies in GoCD.
  2. Unlike other CI/CD pipeline tools that only support YAML format for describing pipelines, GoCD lets you implement ‘pipeline as code’ in YAML and JSON formats.
  3. VSM in GoCD gives a complete real-time visualization of the end-to-end implementation of the workflow.
  4. GoCD still has an evolving plugin ecosystem even though its plugin ecosystem is not as extensive as Jenkins.
  5. GoCD handles user authentication and user authorization.
  6. It is one of the best CI/CD tools, as it can work with Windows, macOS, Docker, and more.
  7. Like other CI/CD pipeline tools, it is easy to configure dependencies in GoCD. It also supports parallel execution, which is a must-have feature for DevOps testing.

7. CodeShip

CodeShipis a hosted Continuous Integration platform. If your organization uses GitHub for version controlling systems, CodeShip could be a huge value-add. The primary reason being its capability to enable testing, build, and deployment directly from GitHub projects.

It follows a freemium pricing model where 100 builds per month are free for unlimited projects. CodeShip’s simple UI and turnkey environment make it super easy to get builds & deployments in a few minutes.

Salient Features of CodeShip

  1. Using CodeShip, developers have tight control over the design of CI/CD systems. Also, they can customize the environment and workflow as per their requirements.
  2. It supports a wide range of integrations options – security scanning tools, on-premise SCMs, deployment tools, and notification tools.
  3. It provides a simple web interface that makes setting up CI/CD super easy.
  4. It comes in two versions – CodeShip Basic and CodeShip Pro.
  5. It supports Parallel test pipelines on both the variants of CodeShip, and the implementation happens in codeship.yml.
  6. It provides the flexibility to set up teams and assign permissions to teams (or a set of team members).
  7. You can debug the builds from the CI environment itself by using SSH
  8. You can declare Caching per service, preventing the Docker image from building from scratch each time, thus speeding up the CI/CD process.
  9. Multi-stage builds are suitable for the easy creation of builder workflows. It also aids in reducing the image size of the final Docker image.

8. GitLab CI

GitLab CI is a tool that is built into GitLab. It is one of the best CI/CD tools since it offers a host of features like code reviews, CI/CD, continuous deployment, and more within a single dashboard.

For using GitLab CI/CD, you need to host the codebase in a Git repository and specify the scripts for performing a build, test, and deployment in a YAML file named .gitlab-ci.yml, which should be present in the root directory. The scripts group into jobs, and together they are referred to as a pipeline. The GitLab runner tool detects the scripts and runs the same.

Salient Features of GitLab CI

  1. GitLab CI offers developer APIs – using which third-party developers can create a deeper integration into their products.
  2. It is available for widely-used platforms like Windows, Linux, and macOS.
  3. GitLab CI’s web application has a user-friendly interface.
  4. GitLab CI issues parallel builds by splitting a single build into multiple machines to minimize the build time.
  5. The caching mechanism in GitLab CI is instrumental in saving time when jobs are running. You can share the cache across the same branch and different branches, and it is also possible to disable cache on specific jobs. With so many GitLab CI options, it is possible to leverage the caching mechanism on a need basis.
  6. Jobs in GitLab CI can run sequentially in parallel. It also offers the option to define a custom pipeline.
  7. It is easy to migrate from a tool like Jenkins or CircleCI to GitLab CI.
  8. GitLab CI is easy to use as builds can be triggered through GitLab CI’s shell executor (which is very much similar to any terminal-based program).

9. Jenkins X

Jenkins X

Jenkins X is an open-source project that primarily offers automated CI/CD for cloud-native applications on Docker and Kubernetes. Jenkins X is not here to replace Jenkins.

Though it is relatively new compared to Jenkins, it has still garnered interest from the developer community. Its architecture follows the DevOps model of loosely coupled architectures. Jenkins X is designed to deploy several distributed microservices in a repeatable fashion across distributed teams.

Salient features of Jenkins X

  1. Supports Automation using the pipeline.
  2. The built-in GitOps methodology manages the environment. Hence, you can create different virtual environments for development, staging, production, etc. Each environment has its specific configuration and applications stored in the Git repository.
  3. Jenkins X creates ‘Preview Environments’ for each pull-request. This helps the team in better collaboration and accelerating their software delivery, as they can have the opportunity to look at the effect of their changes before merging them in the repository.

10. Shippable

Shippable is one of the leading CI/CD tools developed by the software firm – Jfrog. The DevOps team can use it for making software releases predictable, frequent, and error-free. Moreover, it helps to achieve the same by connecting the DevOps tools and activities into an event-driven & state-based workflow.

You can integrate it with popular tools in categories such as testing (e.g., Cucumber, JUnit, xUnit, Nose, etc.), source control (e.g., GitHub, GitHub Enterprise, Bitbucket, etc.), deployment (e.g., Docker, Amazon ECS, Google Container Engine, Kubernetes, etc.), notifications (e..g Slack, HipChat, etc.), and more.

The Shippable SaaS variant can be deployed on the public Cloud, whereas Shippable Server can be deployed on a private cloud (or self-hosted platform).

Salient features of Shippable

  1. It is available for popular platforms like Windows, Linux (e.g., Ubuntu, CentOS, etc.).
  2. Shippable is available in a SaaS variant and Enterprise variant (which is suited for enterprises that are looking for CI/CD pipeline tools on a self-hosted platform).
  3. It integrates with a range of DevOps tools and repositories.
  4. Its automation platform with Docker support simplifies provisioning, building, testing, and deploying any application anywhere.
  5. Shippable, which is available in JFrog as JFrog Pipelines accelerate features & product shipment, as it automates everything from CI, CD, infrastructure, and more. Pipelines are available for use in Shippable SaaS as well as Shippable Server.

11. Buildkite

Buildkite is a CI/CD pipeline tool that lets developers run fast, secure, and scalable pipelines with on-premises infrastructure. It is free for open-source projects, students, and teaching organizations.

Organizations also have the option to run open-source Buildkite agents on their infrastructure. You can install it on popular platforms such as Windows, Linux, macOS, and Docker. In Buildkite, build’s jobs can be run parallelly by running multiple agents and running the job in parallel over all the agents.

Salient Features of Buildkite

  1. Buildkite can be installed on Windows, Linux, and also as a Docker image.
  2. It has a growing pluginecosystem.
  3. It is used for major programming languages.
  4. Parallel testing is possible by scaling the Buildkite agents and running the job in parallel across the agents.
  5. Buildkite Enterprise also offers in-depth auditing as logging keeps a track record of the actions taken by the users in the organization.
  6. Buildkite’s centralized platform provides improved visibility into the company’s engineering and the provision to create internal tools using GraphQL APIs.
  7. You can integrate with popular tools like HipChat, Slack, Campfire, and more.
  8. Prioritized Support and private consultations (for Buildkite Enterprise customers) with guaranteed response times for high-priority issues.

12. Concourse CI

Concourse CI is another CI/CD tool from the stable of open-source CI/CD tools. The build is triggered over Docker containers. It comes with a web interface with intuitive UI that makes it easy to analyze the dashboard and check if there are any issues with the build execution.

Built on the mechanics of tasks, jobs, and resources, it handles every task (in a job) in a separate container, thereby ensuring that dependencies are controlled and builds do not interfere with each other.

Salient Features of Concourse CI

  1. Concourse CI when used with Git, can be configured to set automatically, update, and archive pipelines using the set_pipeline step.
  2. Every job in the Concourse pipeline has a building plan with detailed information about the job’s dependencies.
  3. The intuitive web UI makes it easy to visualize the pipeline, and a single click will fetch details about the failed job.
  4. Every task runs in containers, which ensures a clean environment on every run.
  5. Troubleshooting flaky builds in Concourse CI is super easy with the fly_intercept command that gives detailed insights into your build’s containers.
  6. Concourse CI follows a simple plugin system with immense focus on the resource (or single strong abstraction) implemented by resource_types.

13. Codefresh

Codefresh is a CI/CD platform built on Kubernetes. It is built for achieving superior speed and unlimited scalability. It comes with complete GitOps support.

With the Kubernetes Dashboard offered by Codefresh, it is easy to monitor all the clusters for deployment, execution, and more. It provides improved visibility into the build process, features like a release dashboard with 1-click rollbacks, a built-in chart repository, etc. to manage Helm releases in a simplified way.

Its CLI called ‘Codefresh Runner’ provides a secure and scalable way to run and deploy on a Kubernetes cluster. Like other CI/CD pipeline tools, Codefresh also offers a cloud variant and an on-premise variant.

Salient Features of Codefresh

  1. Codefresh can be deployed on AWS, Azure, Kubernetes, and more.
  2. Each step in Codefresh is a container. Hence, you can rescue the same step across pipelines without being worried about dependencies.
  3. Built-in step libraries make it easy to add and remove services on a need basis.
  4. Along with integration with popular tools like GitHub, Bitbucket, GitLab, Slack, etc.; Codefresh can be integrated with Terraform, Pulumi, Puppet, and more.
  5. In line with the best CI/CD tools, Codefresh also supports parallelism in build and testing. However, Codefresh is one of the selected CI/CD tools that provides built-in tools for debugging pipelines. This can be done by putting breakpoints in the CI/CD pipeline. Live debugging of the pipeline makes it easy to rectify pipeline issues and test the CI/CD pipeline after making necessary changes in the pipeline.

14. Buddy

Buddy is a web-based CI/CD pipeline tool that can be used to build, test, and deploy websites and apps with code from GitHub, Bitbucket, and GitLab. It is easy to create workflows in Buddy.

Being available in public Cloud and on-premise variants, the Cloud and on-premise solutions include Docker layer caching, concurrent pipelines & steps, parallel building & testing, repository & artifacts caching, and vCPU & RAM scaling. Along with integration with Docker, Kubernetes, you can use it with Blockchain technology. All the builds and commands in Buddy run in isolated Docker containers.

Buddy also supports integration with popular cloud providers like AWS, Digital Ocean, Kubernetes, Microsoft Azure, Rackspace, and more.

Salient Features of Buddy

  1. Buddy provides several actions (akin to CircleCI Orbs) that help create triggers and actions that developers can use to integrate and automate the app.
  2. There are actions for cloud providers like AWS, Digital Ocean, Google Cloud, build actions for .NET, Angular, Python, Ruby, Cypress, etc.; actions for Kubernetes, Android, etc.; actions for notifications like Slack, Email, etc. Actions in Buddy helps in accelerating the build, test, and deployment process.
  3. Pipeline setup in Buddy is easy, as the configuration can be done via the GUI. There is a facility for instantly exporting the pipeline configuration to a YAML file (for using Pipeline as Code).
  4. It offers top-notch performance since dependencies, and Docker layers are cache in isolated containers.
  5. Configuration can be done using the GUI and YAML files, making it easy for non-technical folks to create and manage pipelines.

15. Buildbot

Buildbot is a Python-based Continuous Integration testing framework. It acts more like a job scheduling system where it queues jobs, executes jobs (as and when the necessary resources are available), and generates the reports.

It can be used on popular platforms like Windows, Linux, macOS, etc. and integrates with popular version control systems. It also offers parallel execution of jobs across the supported platforms.

Salient Features of Buildbot

  1. Along with supporting Continuous Integration testing, Buildbot also provides automation of complex build systems, application deployment, and software release management.
  2. The setup and installation process of Buildbot is super easy.
  3. Buildbot can be used with Docker images.
  4. The availability of command-line tools like buildbot and buildbot-worker makes it easy to handle Buildbot master and Buildbot worker.
  5. Testing can be performed on multiple platforms, and code changes in one platform do not hinder the tests being executed on other platforms.
  6. Buildbot can accelerate the build and testing process through distributed and parallel execution of jobs.
  7. Advanced users of Buildbot can leverage its range of customizationsfor realizing customized build applications.

16. Semaphore

Semaphore is one of the best CI/CD tools that allows continuous integration and deployment on the Cloud. Like Travis CI and CircleCI, this CI/CD tool also comes with seamless integration with GitHub.

Using CI/CD pipelines offered by Semaphore, iOS developers can test and deploy their apps in an accelerated manner. Like other CI/CD tools, Semaphore also provides programmable pipelines for sequential builds and parallel builds.

Salient Features of Semaphore

  1. Semaphore can be used for automating build, test, and deployment activities on platforms like Linux, Android, and macOS.
  2. With Semaphore, you can run CI/CD in any Docker image and speed up deployment to Kubernetes on the Cloud.
  3. It supports a range of programming languages like C#, Python, Java, PHP, Ruby, Rust, and iOS & Android apps.
  4. It provides seamless integration with popular SCM tools like GitHub and Bitbucket.
  5. With Semaphore, failures can be debugged in seconds by using its CLI for inspecting logs. SSH can also be used for getting insights into the running jobs.
  6. The on-premise variant of Semaphore is under development and might release soon.

17. Wercker

Wercker by Oracle is a Docker-based Continuous Delivery platform that helps developers accelerate the build and deployment of their apps and microservices. Build and Deploy pipelines can be executed using Wercker’s CLI. Wercker triggers the pipeline when any new code is committed.

Wercker can be integrated with Git and popular notification systems like HipChat, Slack, and Email. Before using Wercker, the user needs to create a user account on Wercker (which can also be done through GitHub) or sign-in using an Oracle Cloud account. Wercker offers two plans – a free plan and a virtual private cloud plan.

Salient Features of Wercker

  1. Wercker supports integration with popular tools in the CI/CD marketplace (e.g., Slack, HipChat, etc.).
  2. It can be integrated with popular versioning systems like GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, and more.
  3. The web-based dashboard has a simple and friendly user interface.
  4. The SaaS offering from Wercker can be operated from the local machine using CLI from Wercker.
  5. The Steps Marketplace consists of standard task templates that can fetch easily through the Steps Registry. This ensures that developers spend time on development activities that matter to the project.

18. Integrity

Integrity is a Continuous Integration server built using Ruby. It works only with GitHub. If you are using SCM tools (other than GitHub), Integrity can be used by mirroring the repositories (i.e., GitHub mirrors the other SCM). On successful mirroring, Integrity can use the project.

The only downside with this approach is that any change in the SCM repository requires an update in the GitHub mirrors. Hence, mirrored repositories have to be updated continuously.

Salient Features of Integrity

  1. It works seamlessly with Git but requires extra effort to make it work with other SCM tools.
  2. Integrity builds and runs the code once the code is committed.
  3. It immediately generates reports and sends notifications to the user.
  4. It is easy to install, as it is a command-line installation.

19. Weave Flux

Weave by Flux enables continuous delivery of container images. It ensures that deployment is reproducible, auditable, and revertible by following version control at every step.

Flux acts like an operator in a cluster for triggering deployments inside Kubernetes. It ensures that the state of the clusters matches the config that is available in Git. The CI tool named fluxctl can be used by the developer to set up automation tasks (e.g., automatically updating the container whenever a new image has been pushed to the container registry).

Salient Features of Weave Flux

  1. Flux is a prominent, continuous deployment tool used at the end of the Continuous Delivery pipeline.
  2. Flux ensures that the new images and the config changes have propagated to the cluster.
  3. It increases speed and reliability by providing version control for Kubernetes manifests and accordingly modifies them to include all the pushed image versions.

20. NeverCode

With the increasing thrust on mobile applications, the CI/CD pipeline tools market is evolving to keep up with the changing trend. NeverCode was primarily started to empower mobile developers by providing them with accelerated development and testing of mobile apps.

NeverCode is a cloud-based continuous integration server that automates the app’s build, testing, and distribution activities. It is one of the best CI/CD tools for app developers, as NeverCode builds the code after every commit, and UI tests are performed on emulators, device simulators, or actual devices. All these activities are performed without any manual intervention.

Salient features of NeverCode

  1. NeverCode is a light-weight CI/CD tool that only works on the Cloud. Hence, there is no need to maintain local infrastructure if NeverCode is used as the CI/CD tool.
  2. The interface can be customized as per your requirements.
  3. It is built for automating the build, testing, and distribution of mobile apps. Hence, it is one of the best CI/CD tools for mobile app developers since few CI/CD tools automate apps’ distribution.
  4. It accelerates the build process due to smarter build logic and resource allocation.
  5. It offers REST APIs and can be integrated with the popular CI/CD tool like CodeMagic. NeverCode will ultimately transition to CodeMagic from January 2021.
  6. Excellent support and documentation make it easy to get started with NeverCode.

21. AutoRABIT

If your organization is looking for a complete CI/CD tool that works seamlessly (or is tailor-made) for the Salesforce platform, you have to check out AutoRABIT.

It delivers the fastest CI/CD solution for Salesforce and can be scaled to cater to large teams and handle complexities in coordinating across multiple Salesforce centers.

Salient features of AutoRABIT

  1. AutoRABIT is a CI/CD pipeline tool custom-made for Salesforce.
  2. With one-click deployments, AutoRABIT can deploy differences 30x times faster as it avoids the necessity to take manual snapshots.
  3. AutoRABIT is tailor-made for Salesforce; hence, setting up this CI/CD tool is easy since it eliminates the extra effort involved in installing Salesforce specific tools in developer’s systems.
  4. It supports more than 120+ metadata types leading to faster deployments.
  5. It enhances the Salesforce DX experience due to its friendly user-interface.
  6. AutoRABIT works with effective version control systems. It fetches changes from the version control system, thereby synchronizing releases across geographically disparate sandboxes.

22. CruiseControl

CruiseControl is a Java-based Continuous Integration tool as well as an extensible framework. It is primarily used for creating a custom build process. The project is hosted on SourceForge, and the project is licensed under a BSD-style license.

It offers a simple and user-friendly interface that provides information about the current build and the previous builds. It also provides a wide range of plugins in source control, building technologies, and notification schemes.

Salient Features of CruiseControl

  1. It is an open-source CI/CD pipeline tool that has a user-friendly interface.
  2. It offers many pluginsthat can help in accelerating the CI/CD process.
  3. Multiple projects can be built on a single server using CruiseControl.
  4. It supports several builders like Ant, Maven, NAnt, Phing, Rake, and Xcode.
  5. It can be integrated with popular SCM tools like Git, SVN, ClearCase, Perforce, and more.

23. Bitrise

Bitrise is one of the best CI/CD tools that offer mobile-first features instrumental in building, testing, and deploying mobile apps at an accelerated pace. It is a cloud-based CI/CD tool that eliminates the need to invest in expensive hardware. It is free to use for individual mobile-app developers and open-source projects.

It can run builds on macOS and Linux machines. Bitrise supports major programming languages (including languages for building mobile apps) like Kotlin, Swift, Objective C, Cordova, Iconic, Reactive Native, Flutter, and more.

Salient Features of Bitrise

  1. Bitrise can work seamlessly with the public, private, and ad-hoc Git service(s), including GitLab, GitHub, GitHub Enterprise, GitLab Enterprise, Bitbucket, and more.
  2. The Bitrise CLI helps in running workflows from Bitrise from the local machine. A single terminal command can be used for automating the local development process.
  3. Bitrise offers Bitrise Enterprise Build Platform (Bitrise EBP), a private cloud solution for enterprises looking for advanced security, flexibility, and high-availability in the CI/CD platform.
  4. It allows integrations with popular tools for Access control (e.g. connect to OpenVPN Server, activate SSH key, etc.), Deployment (e.g. deploy to Amazon S3, sync Amazon S3 bucket, etc.), notifications (e.g. comment on GitHub pull request, Flowdock notification, etc.), code signing (e.g. certificate and profile installer, Android signing, etc.), and more.

24. Drone CI

Drone CI is one of the best and modern CI/CD pipeline tools. It not only provides Continuous Integration but also provides a distributed CI/CD pipeline. This feature is not available in other open-source CI/CD tools like Jenkins. Using a powerful cloud-native pipeline engine, Drone lets you automate build, test, and release workflows.

Drone CI is a cloud-native, scalable & flexible, and DevOps friendly CI/CD tool. Each pipeline step in Drone CI is executed in an isolated Docker container downloaded during runtime. It can be used with popular operating systems like Windows, Linux, and macOS. It also supports the ARM architecture (which is predominantly used in mobile phones).

It offers Cloud (or Open Source) variant, free for use, and Drone Enterprise that can be deployed on popular platforms like Google Cloud, Open Stack, Amazon EC2, and more.

Salient Features of Drone CI

  1. Pipelines are executed in isolated Docker containers ensuring that builds do not conflict with each other.
  2. Drone CI (Cloud and Enterprise) can be seamlessly integrated with popular SCM tools like GitHub, GitHub Enterprise, Bitbucket, and GitLab.
  3. Drone CI can work with any programming language, database, or service to run inside a Docker container.
  4. It supports parallel building and testing, including cross-browser testing through integration with LambdaTest.
  5. Drone CI can be installed within minutes, as it only requires downloading the official Docker image and installing the same.
  6. Drone Cloud is entirely free for open-source projects.
  7. Drone CI (Cloud and Enterprise) has a growing plugin ecosystem where you can find plugins for cloud integration, reporting, testing, notifications, and more.

25. UrbanCode

UrbanCode from IBM is a CI/CD tool that is suited for enterprises that require a range of tools for effective management of their complex builds. It enables continuous delivery through a more stringent process that comprises a combination of on-premises, Cloud, and mainframe applications.

UrbanCode Build is a Continuous Integration (CI) and build management server optimized for usage by enterprises. The building infrastructure configuration and management can be scaled to plugin development, testing, and release tooling seamlessly.

On the other hand, UrbanCode Deploy is a Continuous Deployment (CD) tool used to automate application deployments through your environment. UrbanCode Deploy provides improved visibility about the deployment along with automated provisioning & de-provisioning of cloud environments.

  1. It is one of the best suited CI/CD tools for large-scale enterprises.
  2. UrbanCode (Build and Deploy) can be integrated with several tools like Bitbucket server, Box, ClearCase SCM, Cucumber, and more.
  3. It also supports integration with cloud providers like Amazon EC2, AWS, Azure DevOps, and more.
  4. UrbanCode Deploy (i.e. CD tool) can be integrated with middleware, provisioning, and service virtualization.
  5. It provides enterprise-level security and scalability.
  6. UrbanCode provides project templates that make it easy to manage different configurations.

26. Strider

Strider is one of the widely used open-source CI/CD pipeline tools. It is written using NodeJS/JavaScript. MongoDB is used as the back-end database storage. Like Jenkins, Strider is also extensible and has a thriving plugin ecosystem.

Extensions in Strider are npm packages containing additional metadata available in a file named strider.json. Strider extensions can be loaded using the Strider Extension Loader. Strider can be integrated with popular tools such as GitHub, GitLab, GitHub Enterprise, Heroku, Bitbucket, and more. It also provides the facility to test hosted repositories by connecting the GitHub and Bitbucket accounts to Strider.

Salient Features of Strider

  1. Strider deployment is supported by popular languages such as NodeJS, Python, and Ruby.
  2. The functionalities offered by Strider can be extended and customized by integrating plugins.
  3. It supports Docker
  4. It supports integration with version control tools (e.g., GitHub, GitHub Enterprise, Bitbucket, etc.).
  5. It can be easily integrated with Heroku, making it easy to deploy the tested code to Heroku. Slack can be leveraged for receiving notifications.

27. FinalBuilder

FinalBuilder uniqueness is that it is categorized as an ‘Automated Build Tool’ rather than a specific CI/CD DevOps tool. For automating the build process, FinalBuilder provides an interface that lets you define and debug build scripts. There is no need to edit XML files or YAML files like we have seen in other CI/CD tools.

The scripts created using the graphical interface can be scheduled using a Windows scheduler, or it can be integrated with the best CI/CD tools like Jenkins, Continua CI (a CI tool by VSoft), or any other CI tool of your choice. Automating the build process using FinalBuilder is efficient and easy, as the easy-to-use graphical interface gives a clear-cut visual outline of the build process.

Salient Features of FinalBuilder

  1. The easy-to-use graphical interface makes it easy to automate the build process.
  2. It can be integrated with popular CI tools like Jenkins, Continua CI, or other CI/CD DevOps tools.
  3. FinalBuilder provides an extensive library of 600+ pre-written scripts, which are called actions. It can be integrated with popular version control systems, testing tools, as well as compilers.
  4. Its tight integration with the Windows Scheduling Service lets you schedule builds on a need basis.

Bonus Tool: GitHub Actions

GitHub Actions was initially not a part of the list, as I didn’t use it personally. But, thanks to one of the readers, who brought it under my notice. After having my hands on it , I really found it worth making the list of top CI/CD tools available today.

github actions

Introduced in 2018, GitHub Actions is a comparatively new tool to perform the CI/CD. With GitHub Actions, you can easily create custom SDLC workflows in your GitHub Repo directly. This can be done using different tasks/actions, which can further run on certain events automatically. Below are some more reasons why developers would love using this tool.

Salient Features of GitHub Actions

  1. You can create, share, reuse, and fork your software development practices.
  2. It is fully integrated with GitHub, making it manageable from a single place.
  3. You can perform multi-container testing by adding support for Docker.
  4. You can choose from multiple CI templates or even create your own.
  5. Include 2000 free build minutes/month for all your private repositories.

Wrapping up

In this comprehensive blog, we have covered most of the best CI/CD tools that can be integrated with different cloud providers. Some of the CI/CD DevOps tools are built on Kubernetes, and we recommend having a look at the same, as these tools are evolving with time.

When opting for a CI/CD pipeline tool, it is essential to look at whether it offers on-premises and cloud-based options. As many CI/CD tools are open-source, you have to make a conscious decision whether to opt for an open-source tool or one with a commercial license.
When working with websites and web-apps, it is essential to ensure that the optimal user experience is offered, independent of the browser (or its version) and platform that is used to access the same. CI/CD tools like Jenkins, CircleCI, Travis CI, GitLab CI, etc. that can be integrated with cross browser testing (CBT) tools like LambdaTest can accelerate the CBT activity.

We hope this selection inspired you and has helped you find the best CI/CD tool for you. If you think we missed a good tool, please suggest it in the comment section below; we’ll be happy to add it to our selection.

Also, we would like to hear from you: What’s your favorite tool from this list?