head to head · open source
Apache SkyWalking vs dd-trace-dotnet
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars, 6,632 forks, 41 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. dd-trace-dotnet has 572 stars, 176 forks, 335 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Apache SkyWalking leads on adoption by 4,269% (24,988 vs 572 stars). Apache SkyWalking is written in Java under Apache-2.0; dd-trace-dotnet is written in C# under Apache-2.0. Apache SkyWalking has attracted 27% as many forks as stars, dd-trace-dotnet 31%. dd-trace-dotnet was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (apm), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| Apache SkyWalking | dd-trace-dotnet | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 25K | ★ 572 |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Java | C# |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2026-11-04 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.6K | ⑂ 176 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Apache SkyWalking if
- You weight community size — 25K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick dd-trace-dotnet if
- You want the dd-trace-dotnet feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C#
- You evaluated both and dd-trace-dotnet fits your workflow better
About Apache SkyWalking
Apache SkyWalking ========== SkyWalking : an APM (Application Performance Monitoring) system, especially designed for microservices, cloud native and container based architectures. Abstract SkyWalking is an open source APM system that provides monitoring, tracing and diagnosing capabilities for distributed systems in Cloud Native architectures. Distributed Tracing End to end distributed tracing. Service topology analysis, service centric observability and APIs dashboards. Agents for your stack Java, .Net Core, PHP, NodeJS, Golang, LUA, Rust, C++, Client JavaScript and Python agents with active development and…
read the full Apache SkyWalking overview →
About dd-trace-dotnet
Datadog APM .NET Client Libraries This repository contains the sources for the client side components of the Datadog product suite for Application Telemetry Collection and Application Performance Monitoring for .NET Applications. Datadog .NET Tracer : A set of .NET libraries that let you trace any piece of your .NET code. It automatically instruments supported libraries out of the box and also supports custom instrumentation to instrument your own code. This library powers Distributed Tracing, Application Security Management, Continuous Integration Visibility, Dynamic Instrumentation and more. Datadog .NET…
read the full dd-trace-dotnet overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Apache SkyWalking or dd-trace-dotnet more popular?
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars and dd-trace-dotnet has 572. Apache SkyWalking has the larger community by that measure.
Are Apache SkyWalking and dd-trace-dotnet free?
Both are open source. Apache SkyWalking is licensed under Apache-2.0 and dd-trace-dotnet under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Apache SkyWalking and dd-trace-dotnet?
Apache SkyWalking is written in Java and dd-trace-dotnet in C#. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Apache SkyWalking or dd-trace-dotnet?
Choose Apache SkyWalking if you want the larger community (24,988 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose dd-trace-dotnet if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.