Computed, not maintained
Health scores, ownership, and architecture are computed directly from real Git history and static code analysis. No manual YAML registration, no stale portal data.
Comparison
Comper vs Backstage
Backstage is a framework your team builds and runs: you host it, write catalog YAML for every service and keep it up to date by hand. Comper needs none of that. It reads your source code and full Git history directly, so the picture stays accurate on its own.
Understanding from day one, with nothing to maintain
Nothing to maintain
Connect your repositories and Comper builds the map from the code. No catalog files to write, no portal to host, no plugins to keep up to date.
Source-code level understanding
Comper reads the code itself: architecture, code-level dependencies, ownership and product flows, not only the metadata teams register.
Back in time
Comper analyses your entire Git history, so you can see how architecture, ownership and risk have changed over the years.
Why Comper?
Legacy engineering tools force teams to buy, integrate, and maintain three or four separate platforms. Comper consolidates software context, engineering metrics, developer portal visibility, and code quality into a single, automated spatial canvas.
Category-unique spatial canvas
An infinite, living, zoomable visual map connecting repositories, architecture diagrams, and team ownership in real time.
AI-agent native infrastructure
Native Model Context Protocol (MCP) context, AI tool adoption tracking, and agent-readiness scoring designed specifically for the AI coding era.
3-in-1 platform consolidation
Replace separate subscriptions for engineering productivity (Swarmia), developer catalogs (Backstage/Port), and code quality engines.
Internal Developer Platform (IDP)
Provides the foundations, services, and standards that enable developers to build and ship software efficiently.
Code Analytics
Provides visibility into code health, quality, and engineering metrics to drive better decisions and outcomes.
Productivity Tools
Help developers and engineering leadership plan, build, test, collaborate, and deliver software more effectively.
Software Context
The shared understanding of the codebase, systems, architecture and developer activity that connects everything.
Same landscape, different lens
Backstage and Comper both help organizations make complex software landscapes easier to understand and give developers better access to technical context.
Backstage
- An open-source framework for building an internal developer portal
- Software catalog and API catalog
- Self-service templates and scaffolding
- Documentation, plugins and integrations
Comper
- A software graph generated from the code, with nothing to register or maintain
- Architecture, dependencies and ownership, down to the code level
- Your full history: how the software evolved, technical risk and change impact
- Product flows linked to their technical implementation
Architecture, risk and documentation, built in
Generated from your source code and Git history on every change. No catalog YAML to write or keep up to date.
Backstage vs Comper, side by side
| Capability | Backstage | Comper |
|---|---|---|
| One-click setup | Self-hosted build & configuration | |
| No maintenance, no configuration needed | Catalog YAML maintained by teams | |
| Software catalog | ||
| Service discovery | ||
| Declared ownership | ||
| Actual knowledge / expertise | Limited | |
| API catalog | ||
| Entity-level dependencies | ||
| Code-level dependency graph | ||
| Source-code understanding | ||
| Architecture discovery | Requires catalog/integrations | |
| Historical software evolution | ||
| Change impact analysis | ||
| Product flow → technical implementation | ||
| Technical risk / debt intelligence | Via plugins/integrations | |
| Security / CVE scanning | Via third-party plugins | |
| Secret scanning | Via third-party plugins | |
| Living documentation from software | ||
| Self-service developer portal | ||
| Software templates / scaffolding | ||
| Plugin ecosystem | ||
| MCP / AI access | ||
| Context for AI agents | Catalog + actions | Deep software context |
| Product & leadership perspective | Limited | |
| Deployment options | Self-hosted (you build & run it) | On-prem or SaaS |
| EU hosting / GDPR | Depends on where you host it | EU-hosted SaaS or on-prem, GDPR compliant |
Two different models of your software
Backstage
Metadata → Catalog → Developer Portal
- Services
- APIs
- Teams
- Resources
- Documentation
- Tools
- Discover
- Search
- Standardize
- Create
- Self-service
Backstage helps developers navigate the engineering organization.
Comper
Software → Software Graph → Intelligence
- Source code
- Git history
- Dependencies
- Architecture
- Ownership
- Product flows
- Changes over time
- Understand
- Reason
- Predict impact
- Find knowledge
- Identify risk
- Give context to AI
Comper helps humans and agents understand the software itself.
From “what exists” to “what it means”
With a software catalog
- Who owns the Payments service?
- Where is its documentation?
- What API does it expose?
- How do I create a new service?
- Which systems does my team own?
With Comper
- Who actually understands Payments?
- Why is Payments becoming harder to change?
- What depends on this module three layers down?
- Which parts of Checkout would be affected if we replaced Payments?
- How much engineering effort has gone into Checkout over the last year?
- Where is knowledge concentrated in individual engineers?
- What architecture existed before this migration?
- What does an AI agent need to know before changing Payments?
- What would launching our business in Japan affect across our software?
Backstage tells you what you have. Comper tells you what it means
A service catalog is incredibly useful when you have hundreds or thousands of services.
But knowing that something exists is only the beginning. The next questions are:
- How does it work?
- How did it get here?
- Who really understands it?
- What depends on it?
- What happens if we change it?
Comper continuously answers those questions from the software itself.
Choosing between Backstage and Comper
Why choose Comper over Backstage?
Choose Comper when the main problem isn't finding a service. It's understanding it.
When your technical landscape has become too large for anyone to keep in their head, and important questions still require asking engineers, inspecting repositories, tracing dependencies, checking outdated diagrams and piecing together years of history, a catalog isn't enough.
Comper builds that understanding automatically. One continuously evolving software graph.
- For Developers
- For Product
- For Leadership
- For AI agents
Why choose Backstage over Comper?
Choose Backstage if your primary goal is building a developer portal.
If you want a self-service portal where developers launch standardized software through templates, access internal tools, and build custom workflows through an open-source plugin ecosystem, Backstage is designed specifically for that.
It's a powerful platform for organizing the developer experience.
