Terraform vs CloudFormation: IaC Tool Comparison Guide

9/18/2025

Infrastructure as Code tools are critical for DevOps success. Compare the two leading platforms.

## Key Differences Terraform: Multi-cloud, HCL syntax, external state. CloudFormation: AWS-only, JSON/YAML, managed state.

## When to Use Terraform - Multi-cloud deployments - Complex module reuse - Provider ecosystem needs - Team has existing HCL expertise

## When to Use CloudFormation - AWS-only infrastructure - Native AWS integration required - Simplified state management - StackSets for multi-account

## Best Practice Many teams use both: CloudFormation for AWS-native services, Terraform for multi-cloud and third-party integrations.

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