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CircleCI vs Tekton comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 15, 2026

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

CircleCI
Ranking in Build Automation
13th
Average Rating
6.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.8
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
AI Software Development (199th)
Tekton
Ranking in Build Automation
2nd
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Build Automation category, the mindshare of CircleCI is 3.6%, up from 3.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Tekton is 6.6%, down from 12.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Build Automation Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Tekton6.6%
CircleCI3.6%
Other89.8%
Build Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Manas Kashyap - PeerSpot reviewer
DevOps Engineer at Elevenxcapital
Automated parallel pipelines have accelerated deployments but complex configs still need simplification
CircleCI can be improved by making it less costly, as it is very expensive. The config complexity, like the YAML config, can become messy in complex projects. Making it simpler, much like having a Docker Compose YAML or Kubernetes YAML, is necessary from that perspective. Rather than keeping it a SaaS project, they can think of it through a Jenkins approach, where we can also self-host it into our environment, but it is acceptable. It is very expensive, and many organizations cannot afford it. The config complexity, like the YAML configs, can become messy in complex projects. A better DevOps person can only handle it, not a normal person. For that reason, I chose a rating of seven. It is quite expensive, to be honest. As mentioned, many organizations cannot afford it because of the parallel execution prices as well as the config complexity.
reviewer2741265 - PeerSpot reviewer
Software engineer at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Benefit from a smooth learning curve and efficient adaptability
After seeing Jenkins and Tekton, I think Tekton is quite built on top of Kubernetes, so the learning curve is minimal. If you are working with Kubernetes, then OpenShift created Tekton on top of that, making it easily adaptable. Tekton is highly customizable. With Kubernetes, we can customize on our own and create custom builders. If teams have time and want to make enhancements, they can do it themselves. Whatever OpenShift is providing regarding Tekton is sufficient. It is easy to use because we don't need to write every pod step every time. A proper DevOps engineer can help once or twice, and development teams can easily adapt to that, make small shell script changes in the steps, understand the process, and work with it.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Enables us to detect exactly which build failed and why, and to push multiple builds to our production environment at a very fast rate."
"CircleCI has positively impacted the organization, as it has been used for many years and serves as the main source for application deployment."
"The ability to automate the build process in a seamless way and run workflows effortlessly. It supports parallel builds so it can scale well. Also, it covers the basics of any build and integration tool, including email notifications (especially when tests are fixed), project insights, etc."
"Some of the most valuable features include container-based builds, integration with Bit Bucket and being able to store artifacts."
"The solution offers continuous integration and continuous delivery."
"Running parallel jobs where dev gets automatically updated every time has helped our team significantly."
"CircleCI has positively impacted my organization by bringing in faster deployments, which means we can release faster, receive quicker feedback, and enhance collaboration and communication across the entire team."
"It's a stable product."
"The 'promote' feature is beneficial as it simplifies deployment processes by allowing easy promotion of applications to different environments without needing to re-run CI/CD processes."
"Tekton provides a feature where you can schedule the job."
"The flexibility of Tekton is the most valuable feature"
"We can make a lot of customizations, and data sharing between tasks using workspaces is very convenient."
"Tekton is an orchestrator. It provides seamless integration for our pipelines. It offers robust support for executing tasks within the pipeline, allowing us to set up and run pipelines quickly."
"When you run a pipeline, all the jobs are called. It is a very valuable feature that enhances job maintenance overall."
"The ability to scale is valuable."
"Tekton is highly customizable, with Kubernetes, we can customize on our own and create custom builders."
 

Cons

"The solution’s pricing could be better."
"I rated CircleCI six out of ten because I think they need more transparency in pricing, as there are instances of unclear network data transfer and storage costs related to caching and workspaces."
"A return on investment with CircleCI has not been observed, and no relevant metrics such as time saved or fewer employees needed can be shared."
"CircleCI can be improved by making it less costly, as it is very expensive."
"Billing is a mess."
"There needs to be some improvement in the user interface of CircleCI."
"Integration with Microsoft Azure is one area for improvement. Azure is growing in its user base, and supports various cloud infrastructure components such as Service Fabric, App Service, etc. Some of Azure’s deployment models (like Kudu) require a steep learning curve, but if CircleCI would come up with such features (deployment to App Service) out of the box, it would be amazing."
"The product's documentation is an area of concern, making it an area where improvements are required."
"The product's UI could be improved, as there are occasional latency issues. The triggering part, especially the CRD installation needs enhancement."
"I'm a bit worried about scaling Tekton from the point of view of big CI/CD processes."
"Incorporating AI could be a potential enhancement in the future."
"It would be better if Tekton could show the YAML file while it is running, similar to GitHub pipelines, to provide more visibility on what's happening."
"The user interface of Tekton could be improved."
"Tekton could improve by adding better documentation."
"RBAC is really needed for Tekton."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of CircleCI could be less expensive."
"The product is free of cost."
"Tekton is an open-source tool."
"The product is free and open-source."
"The solution is open-source."
"It is entirely open source and free of charge."
"The tool is open-source and free to use."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
8%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise22
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CircleCI?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is that I only used CircleCI on the free tier.
What needs improvement with CircleCI?
CircleCI can be improved by making it less costly, as it is very expensive. The config complexity, like the YAML config, can become messy in complex projects. Making it simpler, much like having a ...
What advice do you have for others considering CircleCI?
My advice to others looking into using CircleCI is to just not get overwhelmed by the complexity, particularly the config complexity. Just try to learn it, as now AI tools will definitely be there ...
How does Tekton compare with Jenkins?
When you are evaluating tools for automating your own GitOps-based CI/CD workflow, it is important to keep your requirements and use cases in mind. Tekton deployment is complex and it is not very e...
What needs improvement with Tekton?
I didn't get the intention of scalability. Scalability means based on the load, it will automatically gain resources and run. The question of pipeline scalability remains unclear. It's quite easy t...
What is your primary use case for Tekton?
We use Tekton for build and deployments. For LMP testing, we use the Tekton pipeline. We also use GitHub CI/CD. For infrastructure pipelines and Infrastructure as Code (IaC), we use Tekton. Previou...
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Shopify, Zenefits, Concur Technologies, CyberAgent
The Home Depot, PayPal, Target, HSBC, McKesson, Oncology Venture
Find out what your peers are saying about CircleCI vs. Tekton and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,797 professionals have used our research since 2012.