AWS CodePipeline vs CircleCI comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and CircleCI are both solutions in the Build Automation category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.4, while CircleCI is ranked #14 with an average rating of 4.0. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 6.0% mindshare in BA, compared to CircleCI’s 3.3% mindshare. Additionally, 95% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 66% of CircleCI users who would recommend it.

AWS CodePipeline

Read 22 AWS CodePipeline reviews

2,883 Views
2,276 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

CircleCI

Read 5 CircleCI reviews

1,185 Views
1,093 Comparison Views

66% willing to recommend

AWS CodePipeline

CircleCI

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 5, 2025

CircleCI and AWS CodePipeline are competing products in the CI/CD space. CircleCI seems to have the upper hand in pricing and ease of use, while AWS CodePipeline offers a stronger feature set for those embedded in the AWS ecosystem.

Features: CircleCI provides container-based builds, integration with Bitbucket, and environment variable encryption, facilitating straightforward build processes. It excels in automating workflows with third-party applications, and allows configuration through a readable Circle.yml file. AWS CodePipeline provides comprehensive integration capabilities within AWS, supporting CodeDeploy, CodeBuild, and CodeCommit. Its flexibility includes advanced migration features and cross-account deployment, making it ideal for AWS-centric operations.

Room for Improvement: CircleCI could enhance its documentation and support for more extensive AWS integrations. Improving artifact storage capabilities and offering more robust debugging tools would also benefit users. AWS CodePipeline may need to simplify its setup for non-AWS environments and expand support for external third-party services. The user interface could be made more intuitive, and more interactive tutorials or guides could improve the onboarding experience.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: CircleCI is appreciated for its fast setup and user-friendly deployment model, reducing technical complexity. It offers responsive customer support with accessible resources. AWS CodePipeline, while requiring more setup effort, benefits from deep integration within AWS, making it particularly advantageous for existing AWS customers. The extensive AWS documentation serves as a valuable resource for users setting up and managing their pipelines.

Pricing and ROI: CircleCI offers competitive and transparent pricing options, providing a favorable ROI for small to medium-sized businesses seeking cost-effective outcomes. AWS CodePipeline entails a higher initial setup cost, reflecting its advanced features and integration capabilities within AWS. It delivers substantial ROI for companies heavily invested in AWS services, though the pricing may not suit every budget.

To learn more, read our detailed AWS CodePipeline vs. CircleCI Report (Updated: March 2025).

Buyer's Guide

AWS CodePipeline vs. CircleCI

March 2025

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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

AWS CodePipeline

Ranking in Build Automation

4th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

CircleCI

Ranking in Build Automation

14th

Average Rating

6.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Build Automation category, the mindshare of AWS CodePipeline is 6.0%, down from 8.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of CircleCI is 3.3%, down from 4.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Build Automation

Featured Reviews

Udhay Prakash Pethakamsetty

Data Engineer Manager at Capgemini

A fully managed service with excellent integrations and a flexible architecture

Compared to any other tools, AWS products provide better integrations. We have tools for all our needs. The integrations are good. The product is a fully managed service. We specify the various stages in the CI/CD process. We can do it without any external tools. Going through everything is usually an overhead for developers. It is like a configuration. We need to configure it only once. The integration with other AWS services has helped us. Our life as a developer is easy. We need not focus on the integration manually. If we work with third-party tools, we must consider connectivity, role management, security, authentication, and authorization. In AWS CodePipeline, if we have IAM roles configured and KMS for the credentials, we need not worry about anything else. Everything can be done within the tool. The integrations are the best part. We can track everything. The connectivity and scalability are good. The architecture is also flexible enough. We can add multiple things.

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reviewer0972521

Chief Technology Officer at Kyberlife

Unhelpful support, unclear billing, and has offers ability to track usage

We've had occasional connectivity issues with cloud resources and build failure due to its own internal system setup and environment. That costs us credits. Support engineers do not thoroughly read and understand issues when emailing them. They reply to me with a totally different context about the problem. Just yesterday, my web applications failed to 'yarn build' after I downgraded the resource class from extr-large to large. I contacted support and got no reply. Billing is a mess. There is duplicate information in the bill downloaded from their website and when I asked for a consolidated bill, they just answered that they didn't have it. There is no transparency on how many billed minutes and credits I spent each day both on their website and the monthly bill which makes it difficult to understand when the monthly bill contains many refill item charges. It is difficult or impossible to track usage and burndown of my subscription and to gain total outstanding refill amounts on a daily basis. Their website doesn't provide sufficient information on credits allocated/calculated for my extra-large resource class.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution's technical support responds whenever you have an issue, especially whenever you need something sorted out from their side."

"I prefer using CodePipeline and CodeBuild in AWS due to their integration with AWS services, like directly deploying to ECS using Cloud Deploy."

"Code deployment is the best feature."

"The tool's recent version helps us to run pipelines in parallel. The integration with other AWS services has greatly impacted our use of AWS CodePipeline. It made tasks such as integrating with Jira and provisioning instances much easier."

"The most valuable feature of AWS CodePipeline is the flexibility of the configuration."

"AWS CodePipeline has valuable integration features."

"Different applications can be enhanced with AWS CodePipeline"

"The product is cost-effective and integrates well with the AWS environment."

More AWS CodePipeline pros

"The automation workflow in CircleCI related to third-party applications is very good and allows standardization of applications."

"Some of the most valuable features include container-based builds, integration with Bit Bucket and being able to store artifacts."

"It's a stable product."

"Enables us to detect exactly which build failed and why, and to push multiple builds to our production environment at a very fast rate."

"The solution offers continuous integration and continuous delivery."

"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."

Cons

"While CodePipeline's UI has improved, further enhancements in user experience are necessary to make it more intuitive."

"The setup time is a bit long."

"In the next release, I would like to see fewer timeout errors."

"If you're talking about multi-cloud, you can't use it."

"The migration process from one source code to another needs improvement."

"If there are many dependancies involved in the setup, it may take a long time."

"It would be a much better tool if it could be made compatible with other cloud services as well since this is an area the product currently lacks."

"There could be a possibility of deploying tag-based conditions for different environments using the same code base."

More AWS CodePipeline cons

"There needs to be some improvement in the user interface of CircleCI."

"Billing is a mess."

"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 solution’s pricing could be better."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"AWS offers free business or enterprise support services."

"I would rate the product's pricing a five out of ten."

"The product is quite expensive compared to other solutions."

"The price of the product depends on how many times you run it. The tool offers a pay-as-you-go model."

"AWS charges you based on the number of pipelines you have and how active they are, and I also think that the root account user knows about all the price-related metrics."

"The pricing of this solution is dependent upon your needs including how many jobs you daily and how many times the developer will be changing codes and completing deployments."

"It is a straightforward approach where you pay for the resources you consume as they offer a subscription-based licensing model."

"The pricing is manageable."

More AWS CodePipeline pricing and cost advice

"The price of CircleCI could be less expensive."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

14%

Government

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

21%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

Which AWS solution would you choose - CodeStar or CodePipeline?

Both AWS solutions deliver solid options, with uniquely different features. AWS CodeStar allows for quick development, building, and deployments of apps. It also provides web application and web se...

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What do you like most about AWS CodePipeline?

Code deployment is the best feature.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AWS CodePipeline?

AWS CodePipeline and its associated services do not incur significant additional charges. The cost primarily comes from deploying other AWS resources like EC2 and S3 alongside the pipeline.

See all answers

What do you like most about CircleCI?

The solution offers continuous integration and continuous delivery.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CircleCI?

Beware of skyrocketing bills as CircleCI does not provide transparency into how they charge refills. Their monthly billing statement is almost unreadable and their online dashboard doesn't provide ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with CircleCI?

See all answers

Comparisons

GitLab vs AWS CodePipeline

Compared 65% of the time

Jenkins vs AWS CodePipeline

Compared 12% of the time

GitHub Actions vs AWS CodePipeline

Compared 10% of the time

AWS CodeStar vs AWS CodePipeline

Compared 6% of the time

Tekton vs AWS CodePipeline

Compared 3% of the time

More AWS CodePipeline Competitors

Tekton vs CircleCI

Compared 24% of the time

TeamCity vs CircleCI

Compared 24% of the time

GitHub Actions vs CircleCI

Compared 15% of the time

GitLab vs CircleCI

Compared 11% of the time

Jenkins vs CircleCI

Compared 8% of the time

More CircleCI Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

AWS CodePipeline

March 2025

Download AWS CodePipeline product report

Buyer's Guide

Build Automation

March 2025

Download CircleCI product report

Also Known As

CodePipeline

No data available

Overview

AWS CodePipeline is a fully managed continuous delivery service that helps you automate your release pipelines for fast and reliable application and infrastructure updates. CodePipeline automates the build, test, and deploy phases of your release process every time there is a code change, based on the release model you define. This enables you to rapidly and reliably deliver features and updates. You can easily integrate AWS CodePipeline with third-party services such as GitHub or with your own custom plugin. With AWS CodePipeline, you only pay for what you use. There are no upfront fees or long-term commitments.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

CircleCI is a leading platform for automating continuous integration and deployment (CI/CD), valued for its capability to manage software updates efficiently. With an easy-to-configure system using YAML files and robust Docker support, CircleCI streamlines backend updates, frontend developments, and mobile app testing across devices. Its parallelism feature and insightful dashboard reduce processing times and improve workflow visibility, respectively, enhancing team collaboration and productivity while maintaining high-quality outputs across development stages.

CircleCI

Sample Customers

Expedia, Intuit, Royal Dutch Shell, Brooks Brothers

Shopify, Zenefits, Concur Technologies, CyberAgent

Buyer's Guide

AWS CodePipeline vs. CircleCI

March 2025

Free Report: AWS CodePipeline vs. CircleCI

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