Temporal vs Camunda vs Airflow (2025): When to Use Each

Summary

Temporal is code-first and optimized for long-running, reliable business logic with built-in retries and state. Camunda models human + system tasks with BPMN and DMN. Airflow schedules and orchestrates data/ETL jobs.

Strengths

• Temporal: workflow-as-code, durable timers, strong reliability semantics.
• Camunda: BPMN/DMN modeling, tasklist, human approvals, forms.
• Airflow: DAG scheduling, operators for data systems, dependencies.

Choose by scenario

• Human approvals + process modeling → Camunda
• Developer-owned long-running business logic → Temporal
• Data pipelines and batch ETL → Airflow

Many organizations use more than one: Airflow for data, Camunda for processes, and Temporal for code-centric services.