The industry-standard Infrastructure as Code tool using HCL — now under BSL 1.1 license.
Overview
Terraform is the most widely adopted IaC tool, using HashiCorp Configuration Language (HCL) to declaratively provision and manage infrastructure across 4,800+ providers. Despite the 2023 license change from MPL to BSL 1.1, it remains the de facto standard with the largest ecosystem of modules, providers, and community knowledge.
Key Facts
| Attribute |
Detail |
| Repository |
github.com/hashicorp/terraform |
| Stars |
~44k+ ⭐ |
| Latest Version |
v1.15.0-rc1 (April 9, 2026) |
| Language |
Go |
| License |
⚠️ BSL 1.1 (source-available, NOT open-source) |
| Company |
HashiCorp (IBM) |
| Config Language |
HCL (declarative DSL) |
Evaluation
| Pros |
Cons |
| Largest provider ecosystem (4,800+) |
⚠️ BSL 1.1 — not open-source |
| Massive community knowledge base |
HCL: no real programming constructs |
| Terraform Cloud / Enterprise |
HashiCorp sole roadmap gatekeeper |
| State management battle-tested |
State file security (plaintext secrets) |
| Module registry (1M+ modules) |
No native state encryption |
| Extensive documentation |
|
Key Features
| Feature |
Detail |
| Providers |
4,800+ (AWS, GCP, Azure, K8s, etc.) |
| Modules |
Reusable, parameterized infrastructure blocks |
| State |
Tracks real-world resources; supports remote backends (S3, GCS, TFC) |
| Plan/Apply |
Preview changes before execution |
| Workspaces |
Environment separation within same config |
| Import |
Import existing resources into state |
| Testing |
terraform test with mock providers |
| Variables in source/version |
v1.15: dynamic module sourcing |
Sources