Healthy competition makes industries stronger, products better, and benefits customers. JFrog has recently published two blog posts (here & here) criticizing our platform, a clear sign that Cloudsmith’s approach - built cloud-native, open, transparent, and customer-focused - is winning over customers.

JFrog’s own CEO has framed Cloudsmith as just “fluffy marketing spin and empty presale promises.” We disagree strongly. Our platform is proven in production every day, powering software delivery for some of the world’s most demanding organizations. Enterprise customers use Cloudsmith to build, secure and deliver software at scale. And we are open about our capabilities for anyone to evaluate firsthand, through a free trial or a hands-on proof of value that shows exactly what it’s like to work with Cloudsmith.

JFrog’s latest tests seem intentionally designed to mislead. Rather than respond point by point, we invite customers to conduct their own comparisons. We welcome head-to-head evaluations because this is where our truly cloud-native, massive-scale architecture really shines. We believe our vision for the software supply chain serves customers best today and into the future. We’ve faced off against JFrog in a number of competitive situations recently, and we’ve won more than we’ve lost. It’s the spirit of healthy competition that has prompted all of this recent attention from JFrog. We welcome it.

JFrog has been able to test our platform because we let them trial Cloudsmith, too. The same cannot be said about JFrog, since they block our domain (and possibly others) from even signing up. This lack of openness ultimately hurts customers; many large organizations have multiple artifact management systems in place, and access to both systems would let us better support customers’ interoperability requirements.

Openness and transparency are core to who we are

Part of the Tao of Cloudsmith is Honesty and Transparency: “Hide nothing, then there is nothing to hide.”

Openness and honesty, both in how we operate our business and how we communicate, are essential for building trust with customers and also how we work together as Cloudsmithers. Transparency is second nature for Cloudsmith; it’s how we make decisions, share information, and hold ourselves accountable.

We avoid that “lies, damned lies, and statistics” feeling when sharing information. We focus on facts, context, and clarity.

That’s why anyone can sign up for a Cloudsmith developer account - yes, even if you’re from JFrog - and experience our platform firsthand; no gatekeeping, no NDA. It’s why we share platform status and service issues, no matter how minor; it’s more important to share the small stuff than to stick to a claim of “flawless 100% uptime.”

Transparency isn’t just fluffy marketing - it’s how we operate, every day.

We believe in Community and Open Ecosystems

Security of the software supply chain depends on collaboration. From open standards to public registries, collaboration is how enterprises actually build software securely and at scale. We support open ecosystems because they accelerate innovation and benefit everyone.

Closed platforms and walled gardens are tempting to legacy software vendors like JFrog, but they inevitably lead to lock‑in and slow progress. Our approach is different: Cloudsmith is designed to integrate, not isolate. We recognize that we are the trusted control plane and data plane for software artifacts. To do that effectively means working alongside the tools and ecosystems our customers already rely on, rather than forcing a single‑vendor stack.

Healthy competition helps customers win

Competition pushes every company to deliver more value to customers. We welcome direct competition with JFrog because it helps us to improve our platform and our customer experience.

Artifact management is critical infrastructure. Software teams depend on us to build, secure, and deliver their products. Choosing an artifact management platform is a decision about who you trust, and who you want to work with for the next 5-10 years and beyond.

Cloudsmith’s growth has been built on long‑term partnerships. We understand our customers’ needs, deliver meaningful improvements, and act as a trusted partner as requirements evolve. That’s what real competition is about: building value.

Talk to us or try out Cloudsmith for yourself.