Softwr

Developer Tools · head to head

Atlantis vs Spring Cloud Gateway

Atlantis logo

Atlantis

Developer Tools

Runs Terraform plan and apply from pull request comments, self-hosted and free

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Spring Cloud Gateway logo

Spring Cloud Gateway

APIs

API gateway built on Project Reactor for building microservices

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Atlantis there is no company, no service level agreement and no paid support at any price, and the six maintainers are volunteers with day jobs, which some risk committees will not accept for a component holding production cloud credentials.; Spring Cloud Gateway released under the Apache 2.0 license, free and open source with no commercial tier
  • They diverge on capability: Atlantis covers Pull request plans, Spring Cloud Gateway covers Routing.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Atlantis and Spring Cloud Gateway actually diverge.

Attributes where Atlantis and Spring Cloud Gateway differ
AttributeAtlantisSpring Cloud Gateway
Pricing modelOpen source, no licence feeopen-source
PlatformsLinux, Docker, Kubernetes, Self-hostedJava, Spring Boot
CategoryDeveloper ToolsAPIs
FoundedUnknown1998

Identical on both: starting price (Free), free tier (Yes), user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Atlantis

  • Pull request plans
  • Comment driven apply
  • Workspace locking
  • Policy checking
  • Multi-platform webhooks
  • Custom workflows

Only in Spring Cloud Gateway

  • Routing
  • Path Rewriting
  • Circuit Breaker
  • Spring Boot
  • Spring Security
  • Spring Cloud
  • Java support
  • Spring Boot support

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Atlantis

  • Making Terraform review meaningful by putting the actual plan output in front of the approvernot Spring Cloud Gateway
  • Removing local applies and the credential sprawl that comes with every engineer holding production keysnot Spring Cloud Gateway
  • Getting pull request driven infrastructure without paying a per-user subscription for a hosted platformnot Spring Cloud Gateway
  • Enforcing Conftest policies as a blocking check before an apply can runnot Spring Cloud Gateway

Spring Cloud Gateway

  • API Developmentnot Atlantis
  • API Gatewaynot Atlantis
  • API Testingnot Atlantis
  • API Documentationnot Atlantis
  • Microservicesnot Atlantis

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Atlantis

  • There is no company, no service level agreement and no paid support at any price, and the six maintainers are volunteers with day jobs, which some risk committees will not accept for a component holding production cloud credentials.
  • The security surface is inherently sharp, because it is an internet-reachable webhook endpoint that executes applies with privileged credentials, gated by pull request comment authorisation that is coarse next to a real policy engine.
  • It is stateful, holding a working directory and lock database on local disk, so high availability and horizontal scaling are awkward and you own upgrades, webhook plumbing, secret rotation and the host itself.
  • It lacks the features that distinguish the commercial alternatives, with no native drift detection, no cost estimation, no managed state interface and no policy engine beyond the Conftest integration.
  • Terragrunt and monorepo layouts are not first-class, requiring hand-written custom workflows and repository configuration that becomes a growing maintenance burden as the number of repositories increases.

Spring Cloud Gateway

  • Released under the Apache 2.0 license, free and open source with no commercial tier

Pricing, plan by plan

Atlantis

Free
  • AtlantisFree
    • Apache-2.0, no usage limits and no seat count
    • No commercial edition and no paid support tier
    • Community support through GitHub and the CNCF Slack channel

Spring Cloud Gateway

Free
  • Open SourceFree
    • Core Spring Cloud Gateway
    • Community support

Which should you pick?

Choose Atlantis if

  • You need pull request plans.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Self-hosted.
  • You also want comment driven apply.
Atlantis review

Choose Spring Cloud Gateway if

  • You need routing.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Java, Spring Boot.
  • You also want path rewriting.
Spring Cloud Gateway review

Questions people ask

Is Atlantis or Spring Cloud Gateway better?
Neither clearly leads. Atlantis starts at Free and Spring Cloud Gateway at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Atlantis or Spring Cloud Gateway?
Atlantis starts at Free and Spring Cloud Gateway at Free.
Does Atlantis or Spring Cloud Gateway run on more platforms?
Atlantis runs on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Self-hosted. Spring Cloud Gateway runs on Java, Spring Boot.
Can I use Atlantis for free?
Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Atlantis best used for?
Atlantis is most often used for making terraform review meaningful by putting the actual plan output in front of the approver, removing local applies and the credential sprawl that comes with every engineer holding production keys, getting pull request driven infrastructure without paying a per-user subscription for a hosted platform, enforcing conftest policies as a blocking check before an apply can run. Of those, making terraform review meaningful by putting the actual plan output in front of the approver and removing local applies and the credential sprawl that comes with every engineer holding production keys are not what Spring Cloud Gateway is typically brought in for.
What can Atlantis do that Spring Cloud Gateway cannot?
Atlantis covers Pull request plans, Comment driven apply, Workspace locking, Policy checking. Spring Cloud Gateway covers Routing, Path Rewriting, Circuit Breaker, Spring Boot.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Atlantis: Is there a company behind Atlantis?

No. It runs as a series of LF Projects under the Linux Foundation and is maintained by volunteers. There is no vendor to buy support from and no service level agreement.

Spring Cloud Gateway: Is Spring Cloud Gateway free?

Yes, Spring Cloud Gateway is free and open-source software. It is part of the Spring ecosystem and available through GitHub repositories with open-source dependencies like spring-cloud-starter-gateway-server-webflux and spring-cloud-starter-gateway-server-webmvc.

Source
Atlantis: Is it a CNCF project?

No. It uses a channel in the CNCF Slack, which is often misread as membership, but the project sits under LF Projects rather than the CNCF.

Spring Cloud Gateway: What enterprise support is available for Spring Cloud Gateway?

Tanzu Spring provides optional enterprise support including Day 0 access to security patches for organizations requiring guaranteed support, but specific pricing is not published on the Spring Cloud Gateway project page.

Source
Atlantis: Does it work with OpenTofu?

Yes, there is a dedicated integration guide alongside Terraform, and it also has configuration for working with hosted Terraform backends.

Atlantis: What does it not do that a paid platform does?

Drift detection, cost estimation, a managed state and run interface, and a real policy engine. Atlantis does pull request plan and apply well and stops there.

Share

Related pages

More on Atlantis

More on Spring Cloud Gateway

Keep looking

Other head to heads