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Developer Tools · head to head

Earthly vs VMware Carbon Black

Earthly logo

Earthly

Developer Tools

Engineering guardrails for the AI era

From
Free
Free plan
Yes
Full reviewWebsite
V

VMware Carbon Black

Cybersecurity

Cloud-delivered endpoint protection and EDR, now owned by Broadcom and positioned alongside Symantec.

From
On request
Free plan
No
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; VMware Carbon Black broadcom's enterprise model concentrates direct sales and support on its largest accounts and moves everyone else to resellers, so a mid-size customer can lose named support contacts and face a substantially repriced renewal with limited notice.
  • They diverge on capability: Earthly covers Policy as code, VMware Carbon Black covers Endpoint Standard.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 30 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Earthly and VMware Carbon Black actually diverge.

Attributes where Earthly and VMware Carbon Black differ
AttributeEarthlyVMware Carbon Black
Starting priceFreeOn request
Pricing modelNo pricing published on websitesubscription
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsWeb, CLIDesktop, Api
CategoryDeveloper ToolsCybersecurity
Founded20202002

Identical on both: 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 Earthly

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

Only in VMware Carbon Black

  • Endpoint Standard
  • Enterprise EDR
  • Audit and Remediation
  • Single sensor
  • Live Response
  • Workload protection
  • Container security
  • Watchlists and feeds

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 VMware Carbon Black
  • Automating incident response procedures across all repositoriesnot VMware Carbon Black
  • Embedding compliance requirements into development workflowsnot VMware Carbon Black
  • Standardizing build processes with Earthfilesnot VMware Carbon Black

VMware Carbon Black

  • A SOC that wants unfiltered endpoint telemetry to hunt over rather than only vendor-generated alertsnot Earthly
  • A vSphere estate that wants workload protection deployed through the hypervisor instead of installing an agent in every guestnot Earthly
  • Replacing signature antivirus after an incident where the incumbent product had no record of what the attacker didnot Earthly
  • An organisation already inside a Broadcom or Symantec enterprise agreement that can consolidate endpoint onto an existing contractnot 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

VMware Carbon Black

  • Broadcom's enterprise model concentrates direct sales and support on its largest accounts and moves everyone else to resellers, so a mid-size customer can lose named support contacts and face a substantially repriced renewal with limited notice.
  • Continuous EDR recording is retained for a defined window and longer retention is a paid tier, so the investigation you most need is often the one whose telemetry has already aged out, and that is discovered during the incident rather than before it.
  • The product assumes an operator: watchlists, policy tuning and alert triage are ongoing work, and organisations without a dedicated analyst or an MDR contract typically leave policies in monitor mode and pay for telemetry that is never reviewed.
  • The sensor operates in the same kernel and file-filter territory as other endpoint agents, so running it alongside an incumbent antivirus, DLP or backup agent commonly produces performance complaints and requires maintained exclusion lists on both sides.
  • Linux sensor support is tied to specific distribution and kernel versions, so a routine operating system upgrade can leave hosts without a supported sensor until a matching build ships, and anything outside the supported list gets no coverage at all.

Pricing, plan by plan

Earthly

Free

No published plan breakdown. See the Earthly review.

VMware Carbon Black

On request
  • CB Endpoint StandardFree
    • NGAV
    • Behavioral EDR
    • Device control
  • CB Endpoint AdvancedFree
    • All Standard features
    • Threat hunting
    • Audit and remediation
  • CB Endpoint EnterpriseFree
    • All Advanced features
    • Advanced threat hunting
    • Live response

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 VMware Carbon Black if

  • You need endpoint standard.
  • You work on Desktop, Api.
  • You also want enterprise edr.
VMware Carbon Black review

Questions people ask

Is Earthly or VMware Carbon Black better?
Neither clearly leads. Earthly starts at Free and VMware Carbon Black at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Earthly or VMware Carbon Black?
Earthly has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Earthly and On request for VMware Carbon Black.
Does Earthly or VMware Carbon Black run on more platforms?
Earthly runs on Web, CLI. VMware Carbon Black runs on Desktop, Api.
Can I use Earthly for free?
Yes. Earthly has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. VMware Carbon Black starts at On request.
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 VMware Carbon Black is typically brought in for.
What can Earthly do that VMware Carbon Black cannot?
Earthly covers Policy as code, Multi-stage enforcement, AI agent governance, Repository-wide policies. VMware Carbon Black covers Endpoint Standard, Enterprise EDR, Audit and Remediation, Single sensor.

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
VMware Carbon Black: Who owns Carbon Black now?

Broadcom. It acquired VMware in November 2023, and Carbon Black now sits in Broadcom's enterprise security business alongside Symantec. VMware branding is being phased out.

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
VMware Carbon Black: Why do the docs use names I do not recognise?

The product has been renamed repeatedly. CB Defense is now Endpoint Standard, CB ThreatHunter is Enterprise EDR and CB LiveOps is Audit and Remediation. Older community answers and runbooks still use the previous names.

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
VMware Carbon Black: Does it replace my existing antivirus?

Yes on supported Windows, macOS and Linux versions, and running it alongside another antivirus is not recommended because the two agents contend for the same hooks. Check your compliance requirements, as some auditors still ask for a named antivirus product.

VMware Carbon Black: Do I need a full-time analyst to run it?

To get value from Enterprise EDR, effectively yes. The prevention tier can run with part-time attention, but the hunting and recording capability is only worth its cost if somebody is querying it, which is why many customers buy it through an MDR provider.

VMware Carbon Black: How is it licensed?

Per endpoint, per year, with the capability tier determining the rate and workload and container protection priced separately. Extended EDR data retention is an additional line item.

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