head to head · open source
Apache SkyWalking vs tracing
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars, 6,632 forks, 41 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. tracing has 6,954 stars, 960 forks, 887 open issues and last shipped 7 days ago. Apache SkyWalking leads on adoption by 259% (24,988 vs 6,954 stars). Apache SkyWalking is written in Java under Apache-2.0; tracing is written in Rust under MIT. Apache SkyWalking has attracted 27% as many forks as stars, tracing 14%. 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 | tracing | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 25K | ★ 7.0K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Java | Rust |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2026-10-29 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.6K | ⑂ 960 |
| 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 tracing if
- You want the tracing feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You evaluated both and tracing 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 tracing
![Tracing — Structured, application level diagnostics][splash] [splash]: [![Crates.io][crates badge]][crates url] [![Documentation][docs badge]][docs url] [![Documentation (v0.2.x)][docs v0.2.x badge]][docs v0.2.x url] [![MIT licensed][mit badge]][mit url] [![Build Status][actions badge]][actions url] [![Discord chat][discord badge]][discord url] [crates badge]: [crates url]: [docs badge]: [docs url]: [docs v0.2.x badge]: [docs v0.2.x url]: [mit badge]: [mit url]: LICENSE [actions badge]: [actions url]: [discord badge]: [discord url]: Website Chat Overview tracing is a framework for instrumenting Rust programs…
read the full tracing overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Apache SkyWalking or tracing more popular?
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars and tracing has 6,954. Apache SkyWalking has the larger community by that measure.
Are Apache SkyWalking and tracing free?
Both are open source. Apache SkyWalking is licensed under Apache-2.0 and tracing under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Apache SkyWalking and tracing?
Apache SkyWalking is written in Java and tracing in Rust. 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 tracing?
Choose Apache SkyWalking if you want the larger community (24,988 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose tracing if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.