# StackStorm review (2026): is it any good? > Open-source event-driven automation for DevOps and SRE teams Checked Nov 13, 2026 ยท graded Nov 13, 2026 by ToolGPA. StackStorm is a free, open-source automation engine that connects apps, services and workflows. Sensors watch for events, rules map those events to actions or multi-step workflows, and a web UI, command-line client and REST API are provided. It is hosted as a Linux Foundation project. - **Category:** Automation - **Made by:** StackStorm, a Series of LF Projects, LLC - **Website:** https://stackstorm.com - **Runs on:** Web, Linux - **Who should skip it:** Skip it if you don't want to host software, since no hosted service is listed. - **Facts last checked:** Nov 13, 2026 ## Pricing As of Nov 13, 2026, StackStorm is free to use. - **Pricing model:** Free - **Free plan:** None. - **Free trial:** None listed. | Plan | Price | What you get | | --- | --- | --- | | Open source | $0 | Free software you install and run yourself. The project's pages list no paid plans. | Read from https://stackstorm.com on Nov 13, 2026. Prices change, so confirm with StackStorm before buying. ## Key features - **Sensors and triggers:** Sensors are Python plugins that watch for events in outside systems and emit triggers, such as timers, webhooks or a monitoring alert. - **Rules:** Rules map triggers to actions or workflows, with matching criteria and a mapping from the trigger payload to the action's inputs. - **Actions and workflows:** Actions are outbound integrations such as SSH or REST calls, and workflows string several actions together with order, conditions and data passing. - **Packs and Exchange:** Packs group integrations and automations for sharing, and many are published on StackStorm Exchange. - **Audit trail:** Manual and automated action executions are recorded with their triggering context and results, and audit logs can feed tools such as Splunk and syslog. - **ChatOps, web UI and API:** The docs describe ChatOps support, a web UI, a CLI client, a REST API and Python client bindings. ## Good for - DevOps and SRE teams automating remediation and incident response - Teams that want event-driven rules and ChatOps on their own infrastructure - Engineers comfortable writing automation as Python and YAML ## Worth knowing - It is self-hosted: the install docs cover Ubuntu and RHEL-compatible Linux, Docker and Kubernetes, and no hosted service is listed. - The project lists no paid plan or vendor support; help comes from the community Slack, forums and GitHub. - Custom sensors and actions are written as Python plugins or scripts, so it suits technical teams. ## ToolGPA grades **GPA: 2.4 out of 4**, graded Nov 13, 2026. StackStorm is a free, open-source automation engine where sensors watch for events, rules fire actions and workflows, and there's a web UI, ChatOps and an API. You install and run it yourself, there's no paid support, and custom sensors and actions are written in Python. - **Value for money: C.** $0 for open-source software, but you run it on your own machines. That puts it in the middle. - **Free plan and trial: B.** No paid plan; it costs only the servers you host it on. - **Features: B.** Sensors, rules, workflows, packs, an audit trail, ChatOps and an API. The core job is covered. - **Ease of use: D.** No store rating on record. You install it on Linux, Docker or Kubernetes and write Python. - **Platforms and integrations: B.** Web UI and Linux, with 7 integrations and an API. These are ToolGPA's own grades. Graded from this listing, whose facts were read from the StackStorm project's own pages on 13 November 2026. Not based on using the product, and shorter than our full reviews. ## Where it stands among automation tools - StackStorm's GPA of 2.4 is higher than 90 of the 134 other automation tools we grade, and level with 23. - It stands best on free plan and trial (B, above 100 of 134) and worst on ease of use (D, above 0). - StackStorm has no paid plan. - On features, ease of use and platforms it scores 2.3 out of 4, and no tool on the category's chart scores higher without costing more. The category's chart of price against score: https://toolgpa.com/charts/automation ## Keep it, or make your own? **Keep it.** StackStorm is free, so making your own would save you nothing. And it is not the kind of software a weekend replaces. It is one of the better ones too: its GPA of 2.4 is higher than 90 of the 134 other automation tools we grade. - You could not: Connections to other products, each kept working as those products change. - You could not: A real app for Linux. Something home-made would be a web page. - You could not: What a company asks for before it lets staff use something: audit logs. - You could not: The depth: we grade its features B, which means it covers the whole job. A judgement by ToolGPA from this listing, by rules that are the same for every tool. Nothing was built to test it. ## Works with Docker, OpenStack, Puppet, Jira, Sensu, Splunk, Slack **Tags:** Open source, Self-hostable, Workflow automation, Public API ## Alternatives - [Rundeck](https://toolgpa.com/tools/rundeck): Runbook automation and job scheduling for IT operations. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/rundeck-vs-stackstorm) - [Kestra](https://toolgpa.com/tools/kestra): Open-source workflow orchestration platform defined in YAML. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/kestra-vs-stackstorm) - [Tines](https://toolgpa.com/tools/tines): Workflow automation and AI agents for security and IT teams. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/stackstorm-vs-tines) - [Apache Airflow](https://toolgpa.com/tools/apache-airflow): Open-source platform for authoring and scheduling workflows in Python. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/apache-airflow-vs-stackstorm) - [Argo Workflows](https://toolgpa.com/tools/argo-workflows): Open-source container-native workflow engine for Kubernetes. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/argo-workflows-vs-stackstorm) ## Sources The prices, plans, platforms and features above were read from these pages on Nov 13, 2026: - https://stackstorm.com - https://stackstorm.com/features/ - https://docs.stackstorm.com/overview.html - https://docs.stackstorm.com/install/index.html Page: https://toolgpa.com/tools/stackstorm Listed by ToolGPA (toolgpa.com).