head to head · open source
Apache SkyWalking vs quill
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars, 6,632 forks, 41 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. quill has 3,079 stars, 275 forks, 8 open issues and last shipped 6 days ago. Apache SkyWalking leads on adoption by 712% (24,988 vs 3,079 stars). Apache SkyWalking is written in Java under Apache-2.0; quill is written in C++ under MIT. Apache SkyWalking has attracted 27% as many forks as stars, quill 9%. Apache SkyWalking 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.
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Side by side
| Apache SkyWalking | quill | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 25K | ★ 3.1K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Java | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2026-10-30 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.6K | ⑂ 275 |
| 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 quill if
- You want the quill feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and quill 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 quill
Quill Ultra Low Latency Asynchronous C++17 Logging and Metrics Library 🔬 Try It Online · 🚀 Benchmarks · 📚 Documentation · ⚡ Recipes · ❓ FAQ 🐛 Report Bug · 💡 Request Feature 🧭 Table of Contents Introduction Quick Start Features Performance Usage Design Caveats License ✨ Introduction Quill is an asynchronous logging and metrics library for C++17 and later . It keeps formatting and I/O away from latency sensitive application threads by encoding log arguments on the frontend and processing them on a dedicated backend worker. Low Frontend Latency : Log arguments are encoded and queued for asynchronous…
read the full quill overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Apache SkyWalking or quill more popular?
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars and quill has 3,079. Apache SkyWalking has the larger community by that measure.
Are Apache SkyWalking and quill free?
Both are open source. Apache SkyWalking is licensed under Apache-2.0 and quill under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Apache SkyWalking and quill?
Apache SkyWalking is written in Java and quill 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 quill?
Choose Apache SkyWalking if you want the larger community (24,988 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose quill if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.