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Amazon ECR vs Harbor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on May 21, 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

Amazon ECR
Ranking in Container Registry
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Harbor
Ranking in Container Registry
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Container Registry category, the mindshare of Amazon ECR is 17.1%, up from 17.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Harbor is 25.0%, down from 27.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Container Registry Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Amazon ECR17.1%
Harbor25.0%
Other57.9%
Container Registry
 

Featured Reviews

PrashantaPaudel - PeerSpot reviewer
Wordpress Trainer at SpeedZone.fi
Has supported container workflows through fast image handling and seamless service integrations
The most valuable feature of Amazon ECR is that we can push and pull faster than other similar products. It means saving and retrieving more efficiently. This is not manual dragging and dropping, but rather programmatic taking and saving. I have used Amazon ECR with Lambda, EC2, and EFS. These are integrable services where you can call Amazon ECR from anywhere in AWS. If my product is not always dependent totally on Amazon ECR only, but if the product is dependent on Amazon ECR only, then having a low time to load, low time to save, and a faster containerizing process time would affect the software's response time. This is important.
reviewer2584182 - PeerSpot reviewer
DevOps Engineer at a energy/utilities company with 10,001+ employees
Enhance security with automated vulnerability detection and private registry support
We use Harbor for Docker containers to build from our GitLab CI/CD pipeline. This pipeline then automatically pushes to our Harbor instance. We are still working on storing Helm charts in the Harbor instance as well Harbor has improved our organization's security and stability in our container…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The ECR solution is good. It is integrated with AWS, and it's free. Everything is free, which makes it nice to use."
"It is easy to use compared to other container registries."
"The main feature I value is the ability to deposit and retrieve images."
"In the case of Amazon ECR, there are various valuable features we can see. Currently, there are image-scanning capabilities that we use."
"The most valuable aspect of ECR is its user-friendliness."
"ECR provides robust security features, including image scanning and vulnerability assessment, supported by AWS identity and access management for fine-grained access control."
"Amazon ECR provides automated image scanning, which alerts me about vulnerabilities categorized by severity, enabling me to harden images and reduce vulnerabilities before using them in production."
"What I like most about Amazon ECR is that it's swift."
"The most valuable feature of Harbor is its security scanning capability."
"Right now this is the leading product in this category."
 

Cons

"It would be great if they could also provide a reference to fix the errors or vulnerabilities in the images rather than just notifying us about them."
"One area for improvement in Amazon ECR is its complexity. It's pretty complex for newbies, particularly learning about private repositories, including how to access Amazon ECR through AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM)."
"There could be improvements to the interface of AWS concerning ECR."
"There were some initial connectivity issues, especially when accessing ECR from our on-prem setup."
"Deeper integration with other security tools would enhance usability."
"I suggest making it more aligned with the Docker registry version two API specification."
"There is no room for improvement mentioned; it's good as is."
"Improving the documentation for easy understanding will help bring in more clients to use Amazon ECR."
"There is a need for more support for public repositories, like the Google Cloud GTR, which is not as integrated as desired."
"The product should integrate better with other storage options."
"The GUI needs to improve."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"My company currently has Amazon ECR under the pay-as-you-go model. The tool is more affordable than Azure Container Registry, and it's worth the money."
"Amazon ECR does not have a high cost."
"The main difference between Amazon ECR and other solutions, like Google Kubernetes Engine, is that I haven't personally used GKE. However, I know that GKE costs around $60 per month, which is quite cost-effective."
"The solution's prices are high in India as compared to the US."
"The solution's price is reasonable compared to its competitors"
"The product is expensive."
"The cost of the product is free."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
5%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise7
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Amazon ECR?
One feature of Amazon ECR that I find particularly useful is its web interface, which makes management easy. The ability to manage and support token image updates is crucial for us. Moreover, utili...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Amazon ECR?
When it comes to pricing for Amazon ECR, that is the only area AWS has to look into. Services like IoT services or SageMaker are very high, and many times customers complain that while the initial ...
What needs improvement with Amazon ECR?
For potential areas of improvement in Amazon ECR, I need to check if AWS has features similar to Azure Defender for scanning, getting vulnerabilities, and patching recommendations. Regarding additi...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Harbor?
Harbor is open source and part of the graduated Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) landscape, making it a cost-effective solution.
What needs improvement with Harbor?
There is a need for more support for public repositories, like the Google Cloud GTR, which is not as integrated as desired. Additionally, more example implementations for installation using Ansible...
What is your primary use case for Harbor?
We use Harbor for Docker containers to build from our GitLab CI/CD pipeline. This pipeline then automatically pushes to our Harbor instance. We are still working on storing Helm charts in the Harbo...
 

Also Known As

Amazon Elastic Container Registry
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Expedia, Intuit, Royal Dutch Shell, Brooks Brothers
AXA, Talking Data
Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon ECR vs. Harbor and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.