Stubborn Contract
Stubborn Contract is the official continuation of Spring Cloud Contract, providing consumer-driven contract testing for HTTP and message-based interactions.
What Stubborn Contract is
Stubborn Contract is the official continuation of Spring Cloud Contract, providing consumer-driven contract testing for HTTP and message-based interactions. Its core and Stubborn Broker OSS are Apache 2.0 licensed and free to use, modify, and deploy. Existing Groovy DSL, YAML, and Java DSL contracts remain usable during migration, and an OpenRewrite recipe handles mechanical migration steps. Contracts can be published through Maven or Gradle plugins or the CLI. The Broker checks contracts across branches and services and offers a CI-oriented can-i-deploy check, plus branch-aware governance. Its listed capabilities also include AI contract generation from captured HTTP traffic and MCP integration for AI agents; SDK support covers Java, Kotlin, JavaScript, and TypeScript. Version 0.1.2 adds Spring-free messaging components for Kafka, RabbitMQ, and JMS and requires Java 17 or later. The Broker can be run locally with Docker on port 8080. Community support is best effort through GitHub issues, without a public SLA; Enterprise Partnerships offer direct maintainer communication and integration assistance.
Good
- Apache 2.0 core and Broker OSS
- Supports HTTP and message-based contracts
- Provides a can-i-deploy check
- Offers migration automation with OpenRewrite
Watch out
- Free community support has no public SLA
- Runtime requires Java 17 or later
- Enterprise Partnership pricing is not public
Who it suits
It suits teams that need to verify HTTP or messaging contracts, including organizations migrating from Spring Cloud Contract. Enterprise Partnerships are intended for organizations relying on it in production that want planning or dedicated support.
Verdict
Stubborn Contract provides a free, self-hostable contract-testing core with migration support and a governance Broker. Teams needing a defined support commitment should note that community help is best effort.
Plans and prices
From Stubborn Contract's own pricing page, checked 5 Oct 2026.
| Plan | Price | What it gives you |
|---|---|---|
| Open-source core | Free | Contract-testing core and Stubborn Broker OSS · free to use, modify, and deploy under Apache 2.0 |
| Enterprise Partnership | Priced on request | Stubborn Pro capabilities · migration planning · architecture sessions · priority engineering · direct maintainer communication · custom integrations · Scoped to the organization’s needs; no public pricing |
The facts
Each one read from Stubborn Contract's own pages, with the date it was checked.
What it does
- Broker features
- The Broker page lists branch-aware governance, AI contract generation from captured HTTP traffic, and AI-agent integration through MCP.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Broker governance
- Stubborn Broker verifies contracts across branches and services and provides a CI-friendly can-i-deploy check.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Build integrations
- Contracts can be published through Maven or Gradle plugins, or through the CLI.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Community support
- Community support is best effort through GitHub issues, with no public SLA for free support.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Enterprise support
- Enterprise Partnerships include direct maintainer communication and support for integrating the project into an organization’s CI/CD and deployment pipelines.checked 5 Oct 2026
- HTTP and messaging
- The testing project supports contracts for both HTTP and message-based interactions.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Languages
- The Broker page lists Java, Kotlin, JavaScript, and TypeScript SDK support.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Messaging integrations
- Stubborn Contract 0.1.2 adds Spring-free messaging building blocks for Kafka, RabbitMQ, and JMS.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Migration
- The migration guide says an OpenRewrite recipe automates mechanical migration steps from Spring Cloud Contract.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Open-source license
- The contract-testing core and Stubborn Broker OSS are licensed under Apache 2.0 and are free to use, modify, and deploy.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Purpose
- Stubborn Contract is the official continuation of Spring Cloud Contract, providing consumer-driven contract testing for HTTP and message-based interactions.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Runtime requirement
- Stubborn Contract 0.1.2 runs on Java 17 or later and is listed as tested with Java 21 and 25 and Spring Boot 4.1.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Self-hosting
- The Broker page provides a Docker command to run the server locally on port 8080.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Supported formats
- Existing Groovy DSL, YAML, and Java DSL contracts continue to work during migration.checked 5 Oct 2026
- Who it is for
- Enterprise Partnerships are offered to organizations that rely on Stubborn Contract in production and want migration planning, roadmap participation, or dedicated support.checked 5 Oct 2026
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