# Guidance vs Instructor — Fit & Features

Canonical: https://trutool.co/compare/guidance-vs-instructor
Author: Snehil (https://trutool.co/authors/snehil)

Compare Guidance and Instructor by use case, features, limitations, and evaluation questions.

## Compare fit, features, and limitations

### Guidance
Control language model generation with structured programming patterns.
Best fit: Developers composing agents, structured model outputs, and tool workflows.
- Constrained generation
- Prompt programming
- Model integration
Before you choose: Check licensing, provider compatibility, maintenance, and tool permissions. Test failure recovery before enabling agent actions.
Pricing: https://guidance.readthedocs.io/en/latest/
- [Read Guidance profile](https://trutool.co/tools/guidance): Read Guidance profile

### Instructor
Extract validated structured data from language model responses.
Best fit: Developers composing agents, structured model outputs, and tool workflows.
- Structured outputs
- Schema validation
- Provider integrations
Before you choose: Check licensing, provider compatibility, maintenance, and tool permissions. Test failure recovery before enabling agent actions.
Pricing: https://python.useinstructor.com
- [Read Instructor profile](https://trutool.co/tools/instructor): Read Instructor profile