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GitLab Pages vs Netlify: What are the differences?

Introduction

GitLab Pages and Netlify are both website deployment platforms that offer hosting services for static websites. While they share some similarities, there are key differences between the two. Below are six key differences between GitLab Pages and Netlify.

  1. Hosting Platform: GitLab Pages is specifically designed for hosting websites that are connected to GitLab repositories. It is seamlessly integrated into the GitLab workflow, allowing developers to easily publish and update their websites directly from their repositories. On the other hand, Netlify is a standalone hosting platform that can be used with any Git provider or even without Git. It offers more flexibility in terms of source control and can be easily integrated with various Git services.

  2. Build and Deployment Process: In GitLab Pages, the build and deployment process is managed using GitLab CI/CD pipelines. Developers can define custom build scripts using Docker containers or predefined templates to automatically build and deploy their websites whenever changes are pushed to the repository. Netlify, on the other hand, simplifies the build and deployment process by automatically detecting changes in the project repository and triggering the build process. It also provides a visual interface to configure build settings without requiring any specific knowledge of CI/CD pipelines.

  3. Custom Domain Support: Both GitLab Pages and Netlify support custom domains for websites. However, Netlify provides more advanced options for managing custom domains. It offers features like domain aliases, redirects, and HTTPS certificates for custom domains, making it easier to configure and manage domain settings.

  4. Branch-based Deployments: GitLab Pages allows developers to configure different branches of their repository to be deployed to separate websites. This means that each branch can have its own website URL and content, allowing for easy testing and previewing of changes before merging them into the main branch. Netlify also supports branch-based deployments, allowing developers to create separate previews for each branch. However, this feature is only available in their paid plans.

  5. Forms and Serverless Functions: Netlify provides built-in support for serverless functions and form handling. Developers can easily create serverless functions using JavaScript, Go, Ruby, or Python, and integrate them with their website. Netlify Forms allows developers to collect form submissions directly on their website without requiring any server-side code. GitLab Pages does not provide built-in support for serverless functions or form handling, although these features can still be implemented using external services or custom server-side code.

  6. Pricing and Billing: GitLab Pages is a free feature included in every GitLab account, with no additional cost for hosting static websites. On the other hand, Netlify offers both free and paid plans. Their free plan includes generous limits, while paid plans provide additional features and higher performance options. Pricing for custom domains and other advanced features may vary between the two platforms.

In Summary, GitLab Pages is tightly integrated with GitLab repositories and provides advanced branch-based deployments, while Netlify offers more flexibility in terms of source control and provides advanced features like form handling and serverless functions. Both platforms support custom domains, but Netlify offers more advanced options for managing domain settings. Netlify also provides a visual interface for configuring build settings and simplifies the build and deployment process.

Decisions about GitLab Pages and Netlify
Howie Zhao
Full Stack Engineer at yintrust · | 7 upvotes · 214K views

We use Netlify to host static websites.

The reasons for choosing Netlify over GitHub Pages are as follows:

  • Netfily can bind multiple domain names, while GitHub Pages can only bind one domain name
  • With Netfily, the original repository can be private, while GitHub Pages free tier requires the original repository to be public

In addition, in order to use CDN, we use Netlify DNS.

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Pros of GitLab Pages
Pros of Netlify
  • 5
    Free
  • 4
    Integrated build and release pipeline
  • 2
    Allows any custom build scripts and plugins
  • 45
    Easy deploy
  • 43
    Fastest static hosting and continuous deployments
  • 22
    Free SSL support
  • 22
    Super simple deploys
  • 15
    Easy Setup and Continous deployments
  • 10
    Faster than any other option in the market
  • 10
    Free plan for personal websites
  • 8
    Deploy previews
  • 6
    Free Open Source (Pro) plan
  • 4
    Great loop-in material on a blog
  • 4
    Analytics
  • 4
    Easy to use and great support
  • 3
    Fastest static hosting and continuous deployments
  • 3
    Great drag and drop functionality
  • 3
    Custom domains support
  • 1
    Canary Releases (Split Tests)
  • 1
    Supports static site generators
  • 1
    Tech oriented support
  • 0
    Django

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Cons of GitLab Pages
Cons of Netlify
  • 1
    Require Jekyll approach
  • 0
    Slow builds
  • 7
    It's expensive
  • 1
    Bandwidth limitation

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What is GitLab Pages?

Host your static websites on GitLab.com for free, or on your own GitLab Enterprise Edition instance. Use any static website generator: Jekyll, Middleman, Hexo, Hugo, Pelican, and more

What is Netlify?

Netlify is smart enough to process your site and make sure all assets gets optimized and served with perfect caching-headers from a cookie-less domain. We make sure your HTML is served straight from our CDN edge nodes without any round-trip to our backend servers and are the only ones to give you instant cache invalidation when you push a new deploy. Netlify is also the only static hosting service with integrated continuous deployment.

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What companies use GitLab Pages?
What companies use Netlify?
See which teams inside your own company are using GitLab Pages or Netlify.
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What tools integrate with GitLab Pages?
What tools integrate with Netlify?

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What are some alternatives to GitLab Pages and Netlify?
GitHub Pages
Public webpages hosted directly from your GitHub repository. Just edit, push, and your changes are live.
GitHub
GitHub is the best place to share code with friends, co-workers, classmates, and complete strangers. Over three million people use GitHub to build amazing things together.
GitLab
GitLab offers git repository management, code reviews, issue tracking, activity feeds and wikis. Enterprises install GitLab on-premise and connect it with LDAP and Active Directory servers for secure authentication and authorization. A single GitLab server can handle more than 25,000 users but it is also possible to create a high availability setup with multiple active servers.
Confluence
Capture the knowledge that's too often lost in email inboxes and shared network drives in Confluence instead – where it's easy to find, use, and update.
Gitbook
It is a modern documentation platform where teams can document everything from products, to APIs and internal knowledge-bases. It is a place to think and track ideas for you & your team.
See all alternatives