head to head · open source
Apache SkyWalking vs lnav
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars, 6,632 forks, 41 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. lnav has 10,778 stars, 415 forks, 295 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Apache SkyWalking leads on adoption by 132% (24,988 vs 10,778 stars). Apache SkyWalking is written in Java under Apache-2.0; lnav is written in C++ under BSD-2-Clause. Apache SkyWalking has attracted 27% as many forks as stars, lnav 4%. lnav was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (logging), 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.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| Apache SkyWalking | lnav | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 25K | ★ 11K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | BSD-2-Clause |
| Written in | Java | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2026-11-03 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.6K | ⑂ 415 |
| 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 lnav if
- You want the lnav feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-2-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and lnav 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 lnav
This is the source repository for lnav , visit for a high level overview. LNAV The Logfile Navigator The Logfile Navigator is a log file viewer for the terminal. Given a set of files/directories, lnav will: decompress as needed; detect their format; merge the files by time into a single view; tail the files, follow renames, find new files in directories; build an index of errors and warnings; pretty print JSON lines. Then, in the lnav TUI, you can: jump quickly to the previous/next error (press e / E ); search using regular expressions (press / ); highlight text with a regular expression ( :highlight command)…
More in Infrastructure & Operations
Related comparisons
More Monitoring & Observability projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Monitoring & Observability field.
Frequently asked questions
Is Apache SkyWalking or lnav more popular?
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars and lnav has 10,778. Apache SkyWalking has the larger community by that measure.
Are Apache SkyWalking and lnav free?
Both are open source. Apache SkyWalking is licensed under Apache-2.0 and lnav under BSD-2-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Apache SkyWalking and lnav?
Apache SkyWalking is written in Java and lnav 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 lnav?
Choose Apache SkyWalking if you want the larger community (24,988 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose lnav if its feature set, stack or BSD-2-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.