| Type |
Configuration Management Tool |
Virtualization/Provisioning Tool |
Infrastructure as Code (IaC) Tool |
| Primary Use Case |
Application deployment, system configuration |
Environment virtualization and provisioning |
Provisioning and managing infrastructure |
| Declarative vs Procedural |
Declarative |
Declarative with some procedural elements |
Declarative |
| State Management |
Stateless (doesn't track state by default) |
Stateless (doesn't track state) |
Stateful (tracks infrastructure state) |
| Infrastructure Abstraction |
Limited, primarily focuses on server configuration |
Local VM/Container-based environments |
Full cloud infrastructure abstraction |
| Supported Environments |
Linux, Windows, Cloud Providers (AWS, GCP, Azure), Containers |
Local environments (VirtualBox, VMware, Docker) |
Cloud Providers (AWS, GCP, Azure), On-Premises, Containers |
| Provisioning Approach |
Agentless, using SSH or WinRM to execute playbooks on nodes |
Requires a local hypervisor or container engine |
Agentless, communicates directly with cloud providers’ APIs |
| Idempotency |
Yes (ensures same task doesn’t run again if no change is required) |
No (relies on external tools for idempotency) |
Yes (recreates infrastructure if there is drift) |
| Learning Curve |
Moderate (YAML syntax, playbook concepts) |
Easy (focuses on developer environments) |
Moderate (HCL syntax, more complex logic) |
| Extensibility |
Highly extensible via modules, roles, and plugins |
Limited to providers and provisioners supported by Vagrant |
Extensible with plugins and providers for different platforms |
| Language |
YAML (Playbooks) |
Ruby (Vagrantfiles) |
HCL (HashiCorp Configuration Language) |
| Orchestration Support |
Yes (can orchestrate multiple systems and services) |
No (focuses on single-machine provisioning) |
No (mainly focused on declarative infrastructure definition) |
| Community Support |
Large community with many roles and modules |
Large community with many base images (boxes) |
Large community with many modules and providers |
| Integration with Cloud Providers |
Yes (AWS, Azure, GCP, OpenStack, etc.) |
Limited (through plugins or integrations) |
Native integration with AWS, Azure, GCP, OpenStack, and many others |
| Agent Requirement |
No (agentless) |
No (runs locally on the host machine) |
No (agentless) |
| Execution Model |
Push model (centralized server pushes configurations to nodes) |
Push model (runs commands locally) |
Pull model (terraform plan/apply pulls configuration from state) |
| Version Control |
Limited (primarily Playbook versioning through external VCS tools like Git) |
Limited (primarily Vagrantfile versioning) |
Full version control of infrastructure and state |
| Ease of Setup |
Easy (requires Python and installation of Ansible) |
Easy (requires installation of Vagrant and a hypervisor) |
Moderate (requires configuration of providers and backends) |
| Error Handling |
Advanced (supports complex error handling and retries) |
Basic (relies on shell scripting for custom logic) |
Basic (relies on external tools like Terraform Cloud for complex workflows) |
| Lifecycle Management |
Good for configuration and application lifecycles, but not designed for full infrastructure lifecycle |
Focused on environment lifecycle (create, destroy VMs/containers) |
Excellent for full infrastructure lifecycle management (provision, update, delete) |
| Infrastructure as Code (IaC) |
Yes, but primarily for configuration management, not infrastructure provisioning |
No (more suited for dev environments than full IaC) |
Yes (full infrastructure provisioning and management) |
| Multi-cloud Support |
Yes (supports multi-cloud with various modules) |
No (typically limited to local environments) |
Yes (designed for multi-cloud and hybrid environments) |