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Heroku vs Salesforce Lightning Platform
March 09, 2025 | Author: Michael Stromann
13★
Heroku is the leading platform as a service in the world and supports Ruby, Java, Python, Scala, Clojure, and Node.js. Deploying an app is simple and easy. No special alternative tools needed, just a plain git push. Deployment is instant, whether your app is big or small.
2★
Salesforce Lightning Platform is the proven cloud platform to automate and extend your business and deliver the social enterprise. Salesforce Lightning Platform is an extremely powerful, scalable and secure cloud platform, delivering a complete technology stack covering the ground from database and security to workflow and user interface. Build the social, mobile apps you need to power your Social Enterprise.
See also:
Top 10 Public Cloud Platforms
Top 10 Public Cloud Platforms
Heroku and Salesforce Lightning Platform are both, in essence, cloud-based things that let other things exist in the cloud, where they can be poked, prodded, and, if necessary, made to scale. They are owned by Salesforce, which, if you listen carefully, can be heard chuckling in the background as developers scramble to integrate their applications. Both platforms have APIs, because in this day and age, anything without an API is considered mildly embarrassing, like turning up to a black-tie event wearing a T-shirt that says "I prefer SOAP over REST."
Heroku, for its part, has been around since 2007, making it the elder statesman of the duo, though its acquisition by Salesforce in 2010 suggests it was lured into corporate servitude with promises of infinite cloud-based adventures. Unlike its younger sibling, it doesn’t concern itself with trivial matters like pre-defined business workflows or customer relationship management. Instead, it focuses on allowing developers to deploy applications in whatever language they like—Python, Node.js, Ruby, Java and so on—like a particularly open-minded innkeeper who doesn’t care what dialect you speak as long as you pay for a room. It also uses dynos, which are not small dinosaurs but rather containers for running apps, though the potential for confusion is high.
Salesforce Lightning Platform, introduced in 2015, is what happens when someone at Salesforce says, "What if business users could make apps without understanding what a server is?" Unlike Heroku, which invites developers to bring their own tools, Lightning prefers that you use Salesforce’s carefully curated ecosystem, full of low-code wizards, drag-and-drop components and something called Apex, which sounds like it should be the name of a particularly menacing mountain but is actually Salesforce’s proprietary programming language. It exists to make sure that businesses can build apps that integrate seamlessly with Salesforce CRM—because if there’s one thing Salesforce enjoys, it’s keeping everything inside Salesforce.
See also: Top 10 Public Cloud Platforms
Heroku, for its part, has been around since 2007, making it the elder statesman of the duo, though its acquisition by Salesforce in 2010 suggests it was lured into corporate servitude with promises of infinite cloud-based adventures. Unlike its younger sibling, it doesn’t concern itself with trivial matters like pre-defined business workflows or customer relationship management. Instead, it focuses on allowing developers to deploy applications in whatever language they like—Python, Node.js, Ruby, Java and so on—like a particularly open-minded innkeeper who doesn’t care what dialect you speak as long as you pay for a room. It also uses dynos, which are not small dinosaurs but rather containers for running apps, though the potential for confusion is high.
Salesforce Lightning Platform, introduced in 2015, is what happens when someone at Salesforce says, "What if business users could make apps without understanding what a server is?" Unlike Heroku, which invites developers to bring their own tools, Lightning prefers that you use Salesforce’s carefully curated ecosystem, full of low-code wizards, drag-and-drop components and something called Apex, which sounds like it should be the name of a particularly menacing mountain but is actually Salesforce’s proprietary programming language. It exists to make sure that businesses can build apps that integrate seamlessly with Salesforce CRM—because if there’s one thing Salesforce enjoys, it’s keeping everything inside Salesforce.
See also: Top 10 Public Cloud Platforms
