# AWS CDK alternatives: what AI models name instead, October 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, October 2026 Edition. 187 of the 252 answers in the 1 category where AWS CDK holds a standing named it neither first nor as an alternative; these are the first choices those answers made. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/vendors/aws-cdk/alternatives/

## Named instead, most often (every category and segment added)

- Terraform: 94
- OpenTofu: 50
- Pulumi: 15
- Ansible: 8
- Terraform/OpenTofu: 7
- AWS CloudFormation: 3

## Infrastructure as code

**Small business**: 57 of 84 answers did not name AWS CDK (AWS CDK is #4 of 10 at 0%).

- Terraform: first choice in 36 of those 57
- OpenTofu: first choice in 20 of those 57
- Ansible: first choice in 5 of those 57
- Pulumi: first choice in 5 of those 57
- Terraform/OpenTofu: first choice in 3 of those 57
- AWS CloudFormation: first choice in 1 of those 57

**Mid-market**: 58 of 84 answers did not name AWS CDK (AWS CDK is #5 of 12 at 0%).

- Terraform: first choice in 24 of those 58
- OpenTofu: first choice in 19 of those 58
- Ansible: first choice in 3 of those 58
- Pulumi: first choice in 1 of those 58
- Terraform with HCP Terraform: first choice in 1 of those 58
- Terraform/OpenTofu: first choice in 1 of those 58

**Enterprise**: 72 of 84 answers did not name AWS CDK (AWS CDK is #6 of 13 at 2%).

- Terraform: first choice in 34 of those 72
- OpenTofu: first choice in 11 of those 72
- Pulumi: first choice in 9 of those 72
- Spacelift: first choice in 3 of those 72
- Terraform/OpenTofu: first choice in 3 of those 72
- AWS CloudFormation: first choice in 2 of those 72
- Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform: first choice in 1 of those 72
- Scalr: first choice in 1 of those 72

Published under CC BY 4.0. The output is the models' output; nothing here is a recommendation by the index.