In West European context, the first fully-fledged populist government that entered office in Italy in 2018 (Conte I) has been presented as a peculiar case. After discussing party dilemmas within coalitions, the article analyses – in comparative perspective – how the two partners M5S and League managed inter-party relations despite their divergent policy preferences. The work focuses on both structural and dynamic mechanisms of coalition governance. Particular attention is paid to the coalition agreement, which is compared to the benchmark case of the German Merkel IV cabinet. Findings show that the Conte I cabinet diverged from the Italian tradition, but approached other European models, despite its rhetoric of exceptionality. Yet, poor definition of policy goals and ambiguous governance mechanisms are observed.