[4] Users can interact with Terraform providers by declaring resources[5] or by calling data sources.

[6] Rather than using imperative commands to provision resources, Terraform uses declarative configuration to describe the desired final state.

[20] Terraform was previously free software available under version 2.0 of the Mozilla Public License (MPL).

On August 10, 2023, HashiCorp announced that all products produced by the company would be relicensed under the Business Source License (BUSL), with HashiCorp prohibiting commercial use of the community edition by those who offer "competitive services".

[21] OpenTofu was created as a fork resulting from the HashiCorp changing the Terraform license to a BSL.