Jenkins

A Java-based, self-hosted automation server with a large plugin ecosystem, mostly used to build, test and deploy software.

Open-source alternative to:

CircleCI

Visit Jenkins GitHub Docs

MITSelf-hostedFully featured free edition

Screenshot of the Jenkins website — Homepage of jenkins.io

What the free edition leaves out

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The free edition covers the features teams usually need; we found nothing important held back. “Not confirmed” means the official pages we read did not say, so we do not guess.

Open-core feature checklist for Jenkins
Feature	Free edition	Details	Source
SSO / SAML	Free	SSO is provided by the SAML plugin, and LDAP, OpenID Connect, GitHub and others are also plugins. The plugins are free, but they are not part of core and may not be installed.	Source ↗
Role-based access control	Free	Matrix authorization and role-based authorization come from free plugins (Matrix Authorization Strategy, Role-based Authorization Strategy), not from core.	Source ↗
Audit logs	Free	Provided by the Audit Trail plugin (free), not by Jenkins core.	Source ↗
Multi-user / teams	Free	Jenkins has its own user database and other security realms, and authorization strategies control per-user permissions.	Source ↗
Backups and restore	Not confirmed	No built-in backup feature. Docs describe filesystem snapshots, the thinBackup plugin, or a custom script that copies JENKINS_HOME.	Source ↗
API access	Free	A REST-like remote access API under /api/ URLs returns XML or JSON.	Source ↗
Support SLA	Not confirmed	The homepage mentions no paid support or SLA.	Source ↗

Best for

Teams that want full control over where builds run and need to integrate with many different tools, languages or older systems.

Why choose it over CircleCI

MIT licensed, with no paid edition or per-seat or per-minute fee from the project. You can use any Git host, any operating system and your own build machines. The plugin catalog is large (the homepage cites 2300+ community plugins), and pipelines can be written as code.

Where it falls short

You install, patch and back up the server yourself, and there is no built-in backup. Much of the functionality, including SAML, LDAP and matrix permissions, comes from plugins that you have to select, install and keep updated. There is no official hosted service or support contract from the project. Audit logging is also a plugin.

Open-source alternative to

CircleCI — Jenkins is a free, self-hosted automation server that covers the same build and deploy pipeline job as CircleCI's hosted service.

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