--- title: Apache Ant Reviews meta\_title: 'Apache Ant Reviews 2026: Details, Pricing, & Features | G2' meta\_description: Filter 24 reviews by the users' company size, role or industry to find out how Apache Ant works for a business like yours. aggregate\_rating: rating\_value: 3.8 review\_count: 24 scale: '5' date\_modified: '2026-08-07' parent\_category: name: CI/CD Tools url: https://www.g2.com/categories/ci-cd-tools --- # Apache Ant Reviews & Product Details Apache Ant is a Java library and command-line tool whose mission is to drive processes described in build files as targets and extension points dependent upon each other. The main known usage of Ant is the build of Java applications. Ant supplies a number of built-in tasks allowing to compile, assemble, test and run Java applications. Ant can also be used effectively to build non Java applications, for instance C or C++ applications. More generally, Ant can be used to pilot any type of process which can be described in terms of targets and tasks. * * * Seller [The Apache Software Foundation](https://www.g2.com/sellers/the-apache-software-foundation) Discussions [Apache Ant Community](https://www.g2.com/products/apache-ant/discuss) Show More ## Value at a Glance Averages based on real user reviews. ### Perceived Cost $$$$$ [ View More Pricing Information ](https://www.g2.com/products/apache-ant/pricing) ## Top-Rated Alternatives [ ![Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform") Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform 4.6/5(377) ](https://www.g2.com/products/red-hat-ansible-automation-platform/reviews) [ ![Jenkins](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Jenkins") Jenkins 4.4/5(573) ](https://www.g2.com/products/jenkins/reviews) [ ![CircleCI](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "CircleCI") CircleCI 4.4/5(511) ](https://www.g2.com/products/circleci/reviews) [ View All Alternatives ](https://www.g2.com/products/apache-ant/competitors/alternatives) ## User Insights Average based on 24 real user reviews. Perceived Cost $$$$$ [Log in to unlock pricing and user insights](/login) ## Apache Ant Integrations (1) What do users say about integrations? Integration information sourced from real user reviews. [ ![Product Avatar Image](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Product Avatar Image") Apache Tomcat ](https://www.g2.com/products/apache-tomcat/reviews) Show More ![Rahul J.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Rahul J.") RJ Rahul J. Technical Lead Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 2/20/2023 "A Very Good Build Tool" 4.5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? I liked the easy-to-use commands from the terminal. We can keep all the jar files needed to build a project in the lib folder because of this anyone looking into the lib folder can say what libraries are used to develop a particular project. It also provides automating the things as per our requirements. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? Nothing as such to dislike as of now. The only thing is we have to put jar files manually in the folder ourselves. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? I used Apache Ant in a couple of my Java projects. I was using it to package my project and build jar files out of that. I also used it to create war files in one of my Web Applications. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Validated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Sweety A.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Sweety A.") SA Sweety A. Senior Software Engineer Enterprise (\> 1000 emp.) 6/9/2022 "Mind blowing and good learning experience" 5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? Used for developing the software and automating the things Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? Fcaed nothing as of now. It is the best one till used Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? We are able to develop the software the ease .Its not just compatible with java programs but also with other languages Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More 6/10/2022 Validated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Verified User in Internet](/assets/icons/anonymous-avatar-purple-4ae1032bdb50ee5682003170c8184aee790d25958bd397abbd384ba52c596a7b.svg "Verified User in Internet") AI Verified User in Internet Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 4/30/2018 "Build automation has simplified our dev environment and made coe accessible to everyone in the org" 4.5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? We run a complicated SaaS application. The site itself doesn't need to be built or complied but the database, settings, and integration with other software needs to be configured for development or production environments. This used to be a tedious task requiring many steps which lead developers to all have their own unique procedures. When we finally got around to automating the entire setup with ant, we got all developers on the same page. Now we can deploy a complete instance of the application for testing with a few scrips and we know everyone is working off the same build. Its even allowed non-technical staff to deploy previews of builds on their own systems with just some basic commands. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? Ant scripts are written in XML which can be overly verbose and a little confusion some times. The limited lack of error handling and reporting can also make writing and testing scripts slightly more complicated they possibly needed. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? The ability to quickly setup and deploy a full environment to deploy our application in has saved time, reduced errors or confusion in builds, and streamlined our development processes. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Verified User in Financial Services](/assets/icons/anonymous-avatar-purple-4ae1032bdb50ee5682003170c8184aee790d25958bd397abbd384ba52c596a7b.svg "Verified User in Financial Services") UF Verified User in Financial Services Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 4/14/2018 "The only site for building java apps" 5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? Apache ant serves its purpose well. It is a great learning tool and accompanying resource for java. Programming can be frustrating when something isn't working. Apache ant is a great resource to turn to for fixing and improving your work in java. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? I wish the format was more modern. The site itself is a bit outdated, though this does not affect the quality of the information. They could also consider expanding to offer information about other programming languages. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering Apache Ant: Apache Ant is a great resource to use for java. It can save you a lot of time and frustration. It is very specialized, which is good if you only use java (its a one stop shop) but isn't very applicable to other programming languages. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? It saves us a lot of time on java apps we would otherwise have to write ourselves. It is a great resource to answer java related questions and figure out how to solve recurring problems by using readily established expertise. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More 4/16/2018 Validated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![venkata bangaru raiu p.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "venkata bangaru raiu p.") VP venkata bangaru raiu p. Software Engineer E-Learning Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 9/12/2017 "Build process is very easy" 4.5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? Ant is an imperative build system, this means that it's very good at controlling the build process. You "tell" Ant what to do during the whole process, for example: "compile these files and put them in that folder". This is great for special projects where you want as much control as possible during the build process.We can use the apache ant in the command line interface too,it is very user friendly Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? While it's true that Ant gives you a lot of freedom and control over your builds, it also means that you will have to constantly reinvent the wheel on how your project structure and how everything fits together for every new project. This also makes it harder for other people to simply start working on your project because of the wide range of different ways to build a project with Ant. While tools that have more constraints generally end up looking the same and it's easier to understand how everything fits.sometimes build conflicts will come,sometimes IDE suddenly getting crashed,Dependency management is required to full fill all other requirements Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering Apache Ant: use this tool to Build the application ,its very easy and convenient Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? Ivy is a powerful tool for managing dependencies. resolving ivy version related issues. Although it can also be used as a standalone tool, it's tightly integrated with Ant and provides all the dependency management services for it, basically transferring all of Ivy's flexibility in dependency management to Ant as well. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerSource: Organic ![Verified User in Computer Networking](/assets/icons/anonymous-avatar-purple-4ae1032bdb50ee5682003170c8184aee790d25958bd397abbd384ba52c596a7b.svg "Verified User in Computer Networking") UC Verified User in Computer Networking Enterprise (\> 1000 emp.) 10/27/2017 "Ant is a Java based build tool" 4.5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? Like java, it is platform independent. It has a large variety of common tasks already catered for. It is extensible: not that hard to create your own tasks. the most popular build tool for Java projects Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? It is not as powerful as batch/shell scripts It uses horrible XML as a programming language. Based on procedural programming paradigm Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering Apache Ant: The Ant design team has always stated that they wanted the Ant control language to be descriptive, and not a scripting (or programming) language. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? You control everything, because you have to largely build it yourself Ant has the ability to include plugins. Main benefit of Ant is its control of the build process Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More 10/30/2017 Validated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![RISHANT A.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "RISHANT A.") RA RISHANT A. Software Engineer & Technical Lead Telecommunications Enterprise (\> 1000 emp.) 5/21/2016 "Apache ant Is a great tool for Build Automation" 4.5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? It provides you an easy way to manage your whole project and build it into a working solution which is otherwise very difficult. It automates the whole process and also gives you option to deploy onto server in some cases eg deploying your WAR files on Apache servers. Also, I like the HTTP hooks it has. It helps trigger events which are used by something else which is used somewhere else which somewhere else and thus helps a lot like to detect failures or success and generate reports etc. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? It being a great tool still lacks on many features and might soon be replaced by other tools like gradle which are much more flexible. Also there can be improvement in its tutorials which are little scarce for a beginner , what i feel. Also, its integration with Eclipse IDE is not that great and comes with loads of errors. There is a need to improve this tool so that it can catch up with its competitors. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering Apache Ant: Maybe you can consider using something like Gradle. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? I have large Java projects to manage, and i use Ant to build them into a war file and deploy onto systems. Ant helps me automate the whole process . I use it along with Jenkins , install a Ant plugin and provide your ant script. Along with other plugins , it works really well. Give it a try ! . Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Verified User in Computer Software](/assets/icons/anonymous-avatar-purple-4ae1032bdb50ee5682003170c8184aee790d25958bd397abbd384ba52c596a7b.svg "Verified User in Computer Software") GC Verified User in Computer Software Enterprise (\> 1000 emp.) 8/26/2016 "Small but powerful, even if a little arachic" 4.5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? Apache Ant is simple, no fuss and ridiculously easy to pick up. A few additional frameworks exist to provide functionality that makes it even more powerful, such as the conditionals, logic and dependency management. As a build tool, it is very customizable to perform any task you need. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? The problem with Ant is that is based off older technology back then, whose requirements did not involve a wholesome dependency management system. As such, it is now overtaken by Maven for dependency management, which is a key requirement for modern build tools. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? Apache Ant solves the problem of building and deployment semi-automatically through the use of scripts such that the process is reproducible. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite SR S R. Lead Software Developer Computer Software Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) 7/28/2016 "One of the Best open source Build tool " 4.5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? It's simple fast and works in any platform :) and its a open source too Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? We have to manually get the remote repositories and it has uses XML scripting Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? we are using it for front end build process and its benefits consists of handling java code compilations and easy to setup and use in every platform. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Sudip B.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Sudip B.") SB Sudip B. Programmer Analyst Information Technology and Services Enterprise (\> 1000 emp.) 5/7/2015 "Apache Ant is very powerful build tool" 4.5/5 What do you like best about Apache Ant? It works on any platform, WOProject-Ant[5] is just one of many examples of a task extension written for Ant. These extensions are put to use by copying their jar files into ant's lib directory. Once this is done, these extension tasks can be invoked directly in the typical build.xml file. The WOProject extensions allow WebObjects developers to use ant in building their frameworks and applications, instead of using Apple's Xcode suite. Antcontrib[6] provides a collection of tasks such as conditional statements and operations on properties as well as other useful tasks.[7] Ant-contrib.unkrig.de[8] implements tasks and types for networking, Swing user interfaces, JSON processing and other. Other task extensions exist for Perforce, .Net, EJB, and filesystem manipulations, just to name a few.[9] Below is listed a sample build.xml file for a simple Java "Hello, world" application. It defines four targets - clean, clobber, compile and jar, each of which has an associated description. The jar target lists the compile target as a dependency. This tells Ant that before it can start the jar target it must first complete the compile target. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about Apache Ant? Can't create password protect excel file.writeProtectWorkbook method not work. . . . . Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is Apache Ant solving and how is that benefiting you? In most of my Java Projects I use Apache Ant for automating the build process Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ## Questions about Apache Ant? Ask real users or explore answers from the community Get practical answers, real workflows, and honest pros and cons from the G2 community or share your insights. [ Ask about Apache Ant ](https://www.g2.com/products/apache-ant/discussions/new) GU Guest User What is Apache Ant used for? 0 Upvotes 0 [ Join the conversation ](https://www.g2.com/discussions/what-is-apache-ant-used-for) [ View all Discussions ](https://www.g2.com/products/apache-ant/discuss) ##### Pricing Pricing details for this product isn’t currently available. Visit the vendor’s website to learn more. 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