What is Terraform primarily used for?

Terraform is primarily used for provisioning and managing cloud infrastructure. It provides a declarative configuration language that allows users to define the desired state of infrastructure components such as virtual machines, networks, and storage. By writing code, practitioners can automate the creation and changes to cloud resources, ensuring consistent and repeatable environments.

Terraform interacts with various service providers, such as AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud, to configure infrastructure without needing to manually provision resources through a console or UI. This approach simplifies infrastructure management by allowing teams to version control their configurations, collaborate on changes, and quickly replicate setups across different environments.

By focusing on infrastructure as code, Terraform enables teams to deploy complex architectures reliably and with reduced operational risk. Users can also leverage modules to encapsulate and reuse configuration across different projects, fostering best practices and efficiency in infrastructure management.