head to head · open source
Apache SkyWalking vs m3
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars, 6,632 forks, 41 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. m3 has 4,909 stars, 461 forks, 222 open issues and last shipped 16 days ago. Apache SkyWalking leads on adoption by 409% (24,988 vs 4,909 stars). Apache SkyWalking is written in Java under Apache-2.0; m3 is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Apache SkyWalking has attracted 27% as many forks as stars, m3 9%. Apache SkyWalking was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (metrics, prometheus), 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 | m3 | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 25K | ★ 4.9K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Java | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2026-10-20 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.6K | ⑂ 461 |
| 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 m3 if
- You want the m3 feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and m3 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 m3
M3 [![GoDoc][doc img]][doc] [![Build Status][ci img]][ci] [![FOSSA Status][fossa img]][fossa] Distributed TSDB and Query Engine, Prometheus Sidecar, Metrics Aggregator, and more such as Graphite storage and query engine. Table of Contents More Information Install Dependencies Usage Contributing More Information Documentation Contributing Slack Forum (Google Group) Community Meetings You can find recordings of past meetups here: . Install Dependencies The simplest and quickest way to try M3 is to use Docker, read the M3 quickstart section for other options. This example uses jq to format the output of API calls…
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Frequently asked questions
Is Apache SkyWalking or m3 more popular?
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars and m3 has 4,909. Apache SkyWalking has the larger community by that measure.
Are Apache SkyWalking and m3 free?
Both are open source. Apache SkyWalking is licensed under Apache-2.0 and m3 under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Apache SkyWalking and m3?
Apache SkyWalking is written in Java and m3 in Go. 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 m3?
Choose Apache SkyWalking if you want the larger community (24,988 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose m3 if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.