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Developer Tools · head to head

Earthly vs Sourcegraph

Earthly logo

Earthly

Developer Tools

Engineering guardrails for the AI era

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Sourcegraph logo

Sourcegraph

Developer Tools

Code search and intelligence platform for large codebases with Cody AI assistant

From
$16000/year
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Earthly has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Earthly pricing model not published; requires sales contact; Sourcegraph enterprise pricing starting at $16k annually creates significant barrier for small teams
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 29 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Earthly and Sourcegraph actually diverge.

Attributes where Earthly and Sourcegraph differ
AttributeEarthlySourcegraph
Starting priceFree$16000/year
Pricing modelNo pricing published on websitesubscription
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsWeb, CLICloud, Self-hosted
Founded2020Unknown

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (Developer Tools).

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 Earthly

  • Policy as code
  • Multi-stage enforcement
  • AI agent governance
  • Repository-wide policies
  • Incident response automation
  • Compliance management
  • Earthfiles build tool
  • Satellites

Only in Sourcegraph

Nothing recorded that Earthly does not also cover.

What people use each for

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

Earthly

  • Enforcing engineering standards across AI and human developersnot Sourcegraph
  • Automating incident response procedures across all repositoriesnot Sourcegraph
  • Embedding compliance requirements into development workflowsnot Sourcegraph
  • Standardizing build processes with Earthfilesnot Sourcegraph

Sourcegraph

  • Large-scale code migrations across hundreds of repositoriesnot Earthly
  • Enterprise governance and code ownership trackingnot Earthly
  • AI-assisted bug hunting and security pattern detectionnot Earthly
  • Onboarding engineers into large unfamiliar codebasesnot Earthly
  • Regulatory compliance and code audit trailsnot Earthly

Where each one falls short

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

Earthly

  • Pricing model not published; requires sales contact
  • Earthly Lunar is a recent launch (2025) with limited track record
  • Primarily GitHub-focused; limited integration with other platforms
  • No public documentation on pricing or feature tiers

Sourcegraph

  • Enterprise pricing starting at $16k annually creates significant barrier for small teams
  • No free tier or standard plan published; all options require custom sales engagement
  • Complex enterprise-only positioning limits adoption compared to GitHub Copilot's pervasiveness
  • Requires indexing entire codebase; not suitable for small or ephemeral projects

Pricing, plan by plan

Earthly

Free

No published plan breakdown. See the Earthly review.

Sourcegraph

$16000/year
  • Enterprise$16000/year
    • Scales with team size
    • Credits for AI features per user
    • Deep Search

Which should you pick?

Choose Earthly if

  • You need policy as code.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, CLI.
  • You also want multi-stage enforcement.
Earthly review

Choose Sourcegraph if

  • You work on Cloud, Self-hosted.
Sourcegraph review

Questions people ask

Is Earthly or Sourcegraph better?
Neither clearly leads. Earthly starts at Free and Sourcegraph at $16000/year, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Earthly or Sourcegraph?
Earthly has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Earthly and $16000/year for Sourcegraph.
Does Earthly or Sourcegraph run on more platforms?
Earthly runs on Web, CLI. Sourcegraph runs on Cloud, Self-hosted.
Can I use Earthly for free?
Yes. Earthly has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Sourcegraph starts at $16000/year.
What is Earthly best used for?
Earthly is most often used for enforcing engineering standards across ai and human developers, automating incident response procedures across all repositories, embedding compliance requirements into development workflows, standardizing build processes with earthfiles. Of those, enforcing engineering standards across ai and human developers and automating incident response procedures across all repositories are not what Sourcegraph is typically brought in for.
What can Earthly do that Sourcegraph cannot?
Earthly covers Policy as code, Multi-stage enforcement, AI agent governance, Repository-wide policies.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Earthly: What is the difference between Earthfiles and Earthly Lunar?

Earthfiles is an open-source build tool that reached 12,000 GitHub stars and is used by companies like NVIDIA, Intel, and Databricks. Earthly Lunar is a separate governance platform launched in 2025 for enforcing standards across development workflows.

Source
Earthly: How does Earthly Lunar enforce standards?

Lunar converts engineering standards, compliance requirements, and processes documented in AGENTS.md files, wikis, and incident postmortems into enforceable guardrails that apply consistently across repositories and development stages.

Source
Earthly: What is the pricing for Earthly Lunar?

Pricing is not published on the website. Interested customers should contact Earthly's sales team for current pricing and feature tiers.

Source
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