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Pivotal Cloud Foundry vs VMware Tanzu Platform comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 15, 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

Pivotal Cloud Foundry
Ranking in PaaS Clouds
11th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VMware Tanzu Platform
Ranking in PaaS Clouds
13th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Build Automation (13th), Cloud Management (24th), Development Platforms (3rd), Container Management (3rd), Service Mesh (8th), Agile and DevOps Services (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the PaaS Clouds category, the mindshare of Pivotal Cloud Foundry is 9.2%, up from 8.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Tanzu Platform is 3.4%, up from 2.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
PaaS Clouds Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Pivotal Cloud Foundry9.2%
VMware Tanzu Platform3.4%
Other87.4%
PaaS Clouds
 

Featured Reviews

Stephen  Hack - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use, simple to sign-in, but lacking graphical interface
Pivotal Cloud Foundry is used as a cloud platform Pivotal Cloud Foundry has helped our organization by the way we've set it up, it's easy to sign in, bind services, push services, and create YAML files. The most valuable features of Pivotal Cloud Foundry are its ease of use and the command line…
DarshanChaudhari - PeerSpot reviewer
Empowers seamless connectivity and integration through APIs while offering robust auto-scaling
I am involved in IT services and we provide a solution to customers. We work with VMware, Nutanix, OpenShift, and Microsoft Hyper-V The Tanzu platform is highly available, scalable, and flexible. It offers native services for autoscaling and integrations through APIs, allowing seamless…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is stable and resilient. In our company, we do not even see any challenges with the solution."
"I find the ease of deployment and management of microservices to be the most valuable features. The platform also has good auto-scaling capabilities."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its ability to scale. The services that connect to the database are also very good."
"PCF is open, so the applications run really smoothly and with little downtime."
"The most valuable features are the monitoring and the deployment is easier."
"It provides a set of developer-friendly tools that simplify application deployment."
"The most valuable feature of Pivotal Cloud Foundry is auto-healing and the plenty of other features that are provided."
"We find its stability and scalability valuable."
"We never experienced any problems with scalability."
"The initial setup is easy."
"The observability platform and end-to-end service portal provided by Tanzu are the most valuable features."
"The most important feature of Tanzu Mission Control is its integration with the other products, especially with ESX and vSAN. This is a strong part of Tanzu Mission Control. In other solutions, such as OpenShift or Kubernetes, you can find similar features, but they don't have similar integration. With Tanzu Mission Control, you get a total solution with only one provider. You have the integration with the infrastructure, virtualization of networking, and virtualization of storage. You have a natural integration, and you don't have the problem of integrating it with different products or providers. Sometimes, different companies have good integration, but it is not always guaranteed. For example, many years ago, Cisco and VMware were good partners in networking, but when VMware started to sell ESX, the relationship was broken. This is the problem that you can face when you are using solutions from two different companies."
"The solution is integrated very well with a lot of other systems. Also, its GUI is very good."
"The most valuable feature of VMware Tanzu Mission Control is the management functionality of the cluster life cycle. Additionally, the solution integrates well with other vendors, such as Velero for backups and Sonobuoy for compliance. Additionally, it works well in multi-cluster environments."
"We feel very good about these features."
"The Day 2 operations support is the most vital feature"
 

Cons

"The Pivotal Cloud Foundry's initial setup has a learning curve for my team, but it was easy to use."
"It is not straightforward to setup."
"The user interface should be simpler to navigate because it t can take time for users to learn it."
"There is a lot of uncertainty surrounding the future of Pivotal Cloud Foundry."
"It should offer more security features."
"Regarding the setup phase, every step is a hurdle. With Pivotal Cloud Foundry, I won't get any proper resources for that. Even if I Google it, there is no proper solution for Pivotal Cloud Foundry."
"Pivotal Cloud Foundry could improve on the technology it is a bit complex."
"In the next release, they should offer additional applications for the databases, and improve the deployment experience."
"The product should support integration with Google Cloud Platform (GCP)"
"The solution could improve by having better integration with other solutions such as HPE."
"The infrastructure is quite challenging."
"VMware Tanzu Service Mesh could add better integration with other cloud platforms, such as vRealize Automation or VMware vCloud Director for cloud providers."
"I would like to see additional support for things outside of Cloud Foundry."
"Customers have noticed a considerable price increase after VMware's acquisition by Broadcom."
"Cost is always a concern. Smaller companies might find the price a bigger issue."
"The implementation is not easy, it is very complex and can take a day or two to complete."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We do pay for the licensing cost because we have opted for a private cloud setup. So, it is a cloud setup, and we have to make payments based on the cloud size. I do not consider it very costly when comparing it to the market."
"The price of Pivotal Cloud Foundry is based on the customer's requirements. However, the price is comparable to other similar solutions."
"The price of Pivotal Cloud Foundry could improve. However, in this category of solutions, they are all expensive."
"Licensing is on a monthly basis and right now we pay $24/month. There are no other costs over and above that."
"The pricing is on the higher side and there are cheaper options available."
"You're paying for the number of virtual machines you want to install in the installation."
"I would recommend that businesses look into the full price for their requirements. The price is high, but there are some open-source add-ons that can be used for customization while keeping costs down, although these might not be suitable for everyone."
"The license for VMware Tanzu Application Service is expensive. The license should be cheaper."
"The least expensive licensing cost for VMware is around $350 per core."
"It is not the most expensive option, and I believe the capabilities align well with the value it provides."
"The price of VMware Tanzu Mission Control is greater than that of Red Hat's competitor solution"
"The product is not expensive, but it is not cheap."
"Since we were at a large data center, the price might not have been a concern for us."
"The solution is bundled in with Cloud Foundry so the pricing is not independent."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
37%
Manufacturing Company
17%
Insurance Company
6%
Healthcare Company
4%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Large Enterprise11
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise9
 

Questions from the Community

Which would you recommend - Pivotal Cloud Foundry or OpenShift?
Pivotal Cloud Foundry is a cloud-native application platform to simplify app delivery. It is efficient and effective. The best feature is how easy it is to handle external services such as database...
What do you like most about Pivotal Cloud Foundry?
I find the ease of deployment and management of microservices to be the most valuable features. The platform also has good auto-scaling capabilities.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pivotal Cloud Foundry?
I would say it is around a nine out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. Just short of Oracle. It's sort of Oracle cloud.
Which is better - OpenShift Container Platform or VMware Tanzu Mission Control?
Red Hat Openshift is ideal for organizations using microservices and cloud environments. I like that the platform is auto-scalable, which saves overhead time for developers. I think Openshift can b...
What do you like most about VMware Tanzu Mission Control?
It definitely gives the end customer a good overview and perspective of running applications in terms of overall workload footprint. TMC provides a very detailed description of your cloud-native ap...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware Tanzu Mission Control?
The price of VMware Tanzu Mission Control is greater than that of Red Hat's competitor solution. I would rate the pricing of VMware Tanzu Mission Control as four out of ten.
 

Also Known As

PCF, Pivotal Application Service (PAS), Pivotal Container Service (PKS), Pivotal Function Service (PFS)
Tanzu Application Catalog, Application Platform, Application Service, Hub, Mission Control, Service Mesh, Build Service, Concourse for VMware Tanzu
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Humana, Citibank, Mercedes Benz, Liberty Mutual, The Home Depot, GE, West Corp, Merrill Corporation, CoreLogic, Orange, Dish Network, Comcast, Bloomberg, Internal Revenue Service, Ford Motor Company, Garmin, Volkswagen, Solera, Allstate, US Air Force, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, ScotiaBank
Verizon, Cerner, Zipcar, Avarteq
Find out what your peers are saying about Pivotal Cloud Foundry vs. VMware Tanzu Platform and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
867,497 professionals have used our research since 2012.