Argo CD vs Argo Rollouts
Argo CD
argoproj.github.ioArgo Rollouts
argoproj.github.ioSide by side
| Figure | Argo CD | Argo Rollouts |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | — |
| Windows | — | Yes |
| macOS | — | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| API | Yes | — |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 1 |
| Spec score · Continuous Delivery Software | 8.8 (#3) | 8.9 (#2) |
| Spec score · Kubernetes Deployment Tools | 8.8 (#3) | 8.9 (#2) |
| Installation | Argo CD offers multi-tenant and core installations; its documentation recommends the high-availability installation for production use. | The controller can be installed with standard cluster-level manifests or with a namespace-level installation that requires the CRDs to be installed separately. |
| Integrations | The feature list names GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, OIDC, OAuth2, LDAP, SAML 2.0, and Prometheus integrations or support. | Documented integrations include NGINX, AWS ALB, Apache APISIX, Istio, Linkerd, SMI, Prometheus, Datadog, New Relic, Graphite, and InfluxDB. |
| Purpose | Argo CD is a declarative GitOps continuous delivery tool for Kubernetes. | Argo Rollouts is a Kubernetes controller and set of CRDs for advanced deployment and progressive delivery. |
| Security | The security documentation describes JWT authentication, RBAC authorization, TLS for network communication, and redaction of sensitive data in API payloads and logs. | The project documents cosign verification of signed container images and SLSA Level 3 provenance for container image attestations. |
Plans
In their own words
Argo CD
Argo CD is a free, open-source declarative GitOps continuous delivery tool for Kubernetes. It compares live applications with desired state in Git and can synchronize differences automatically or manually. Applications can use Kustomize, Helm, OCI images, YAML, JSON, Jsonnet or custom configuration-management plugins, and deploy across multiple clusters. A web UI and CLI expose application activity and deployment controls. Argo CD provides health analysis, drift detection, rollback to Git-committed configurations, audit trails and Prometheus metrics, plus PreSync, Sync and PostSync hooks for rollout workflows. Access features include SSO integrations, multi-tenancy and RBAC policies, with documented OIDC, OAuth2, LDAP, SAML 2.0, GitHub, GitLab, Microsoft and LinkedIn connections. Installation options include multi-tenant and Core setups; high availability is recommended for production. Core omits the Argo CD RBAC model, API, notification controller and OIDC authentication. Documentation also warns about privileged ApplicationSet access and Alpha or Beta compatibility risks.
Argo Rollouts
Argo Rollouts is a self-hosted Kubernetes controller for managing how application updates reach users. It supports BlueGreen, Canary and Rolling Update strategies, with weighted traffic shifting through ingress controllers or service meshes. Without a traffic-routing provider, it can adjust ReplicaSet counts instead. Metric integrations let it assess KPIs and automate promotion or rollback, while leaving room for manual judgment. Supported providers include NGINX, AWS ALB, Istio and Traefik for traffic, and Prometheus, Datadog, New Relic, Graphite and InfluxDB for metrics. It can operate independently of Argo CD and respond to Kubernetes manifest changes whether they come from GitOps or traditional CI/CD. Each cluster running Rollout workloads needs its own controller and CRD; a Rollout specification covers one application, not dependencies among applications. Shared-resource or worker-queue applications may be a poor fit, and infrastructure applications are not recommended. Argo Rollouts is free and open source. It runs on Linux, macOS, Windows or self-hosted environments.