Pulumi vs Terraform

Compare Pulumi vs Terraform features, pricing, and performance metrics side-by-side to find the optimal platform for your engineering workflow.

Feature Comparison Matrix

Feature Pulumi Terraform
Multi-Cloud Support ✓ AWS, Azure, GCP, Kubernetes, and 100+ providers ✓ 2000+ providers across all major clouds
Kubernetes-Native ✗ Not K8s-native, but strong K8s provider support ✗ Not K8s-native, separate Kubernetes provider
State Management ✓ Managed (Pulumi Cloud) or self-managed state ✓ Local and remote state (Terraform Cloud, S3, etc.)
Programming Languages ✓ TypeScript, Python, Go, C#, Java, YAML ✗ HCL DSL only
Module/Package Registry ✓ Pulumi Registry with packages for each language ✓ Terraform Registry (public and private)
Policy as Code ✓ CrossGuard policy as code with policy packs ✓ Sentinel (enterprise) and OPA integration
Drift Detection ✓ Pulumi refresh and drift detection via preview ✓ Terraform plan detects drift, Terraform Cloud notifications
Preview/Plan ✓ pulumi preview with detailed diff output ✓ Terraform plan output before apply
Secret Management ✓ Encrypted configuration with Pulumi ESC ✓ Variables with sensitive flag, Vault integration
Team Collaboration ✓ Pulumi Cloud with stacks, RBAC, team collaboration ✓ Terraform Cloud with RBAC, runs, workspaces
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About Pulumi

Pulumi is a modern Infrastructure as Code platform that lets you define cloud infrastructure using general-purpose programming languages like TypeScript, Python, Go, and C# instead of a domain-specific language. This enables using loops, functions, and existing package ecosystems within infrastructure code. Pulumi supports all major cloud providers, offers state management, secrets handling, and automation API for embedding infrastructure provisioning in applications.

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About Terraform

Terraform by HashiCorp is the industry-standard Infrastructure as Code tool that enables teams to provision and manage cloud infrastructure across 2000+ providers using declarative HCL (HashiCorp Configuration Language). It maintains state files to track resource changes, supports modules for reusable infrastructure patterns, and offers workspaces for environment management. Terraform Cloud adds remote state management, policy enforcement, and team collaboration features.

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