Concourse vs Drone CI
Self-host pick — both replace CircleCI (Hosted CI/CD).
Both Concourse and Drone CI self-host as a replacement for CircleCI (Hosted CI/CD). Pick Concourse if you want platform / SRE teams that want declarative pipeline-as-data and reproducible builds with explicit resource versioning; pick Drone CI if you want container-native pipelines where every step is a Docker image — Drone is the most natural fit for that mental model. Both are Apache-family licensed and similar to set up.
| Concourseopen-source | Drone CIopen-source | |
|---|---|---|
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Setup time | 30min docker-compose (web + worker + Postgres) | 20min docker-compose (Drone server + at least one runner) |
| Monthly cost | $15-30/mo VPS — workers eat resources during builds. | $10-20/mo VPS for the server; runners are separate (one $5 VPS per concurrent build). |
| GitHub | concourse/concourse | harness/drone |
| Replaces | CircleCI | CircleCI |
Good fit for
Concourse
Platform / SRE teams that want declarative pipeline-as-data and reproducible builds with explicit resource versioning.
Weak at:Steep learning curve; the resource/task abstraction is unfamiliar to teams coming from CircleCI's job/step model.
Drone CI
Container-native pipelines where every step is a Docker image — Drone is the most natural fit for that mental model.
Weak at:macOS / iOS builds need self-hosted runners with manual setup; GPU builds similarly bring-your-own.
In a terminal? npx -y github:SolvoHQ/os-alt-cli circleci prints CircleCI's self-host options including both —
how the CLI works →
FAQ
Which is easier to self-host, Concourse or Drone CI?
Concourse: 30min docker-compose (web + worker + Postgres). Drone CI: 20min docker-compose (Drone server + at least one runner).
What does each cost to run?
Concourse: $15-30/mo VPS — workers eat resources during builds.. Drone CI: $10-20/mo VPS for the server; runners are separate (one $5 VPS per concurrent build).. Both projects are free and open source.
Do Concourse and Drone CI replace the same SaaS?
Yes — both are open-source alternatives to CircleCI.