head to head · open source
Apache SkyWalking vs whisper
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars, 6,632 forks, 41 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. whisper has 1,260 stars, 320 forks, 8 open issues and last shipped 11 months ago. Apache SkyWalking leads on adoption by 1,883% (24,988 vs 1,260 stars). Apache SkyWalking is written in Java under Apache-2.0; whisper is written in Python under Apache-2.0. Apache SkyWalking has attracted 27% as many forks as stars, whisper 25%. 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 (metrics), 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 | whisper | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 25K | ★ 1.3K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Java | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2025-12-01 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.6K | ⑂ 320 |
| 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 whisper if
- You want the whisper feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and whisper 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 whisper
Whisper Overview Whisper is one of three components within the Graphite project: 1. Graphite Web, a Django based web application that renders graphs and dashboards 2. The Carbon metric processing daemons 3. The Whisper time series database library Whisper is a fixed size database, similar in design and purpose to RRD (round robin database). It provides fast, reliable storage of numeric data over time. Whisper allows for higher resolution (seconds per point) of recent data to degrade into lower resolutions for long term retention of historical data. Installation, Configuration and Usage Please refer to the…
read the full whisper overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Apache SkyWalking or whisper more popular?
Apache SkyWalking has 24,988 GitHub stars and whisper has 1,260. Apache SkyWalking has the larger community by that measure.
Are Apache SkyWalking and whisper free?
Both are open source. Apache SkyWalking is licensed under Apache-2.0 and whisper under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Apache SkyWalking and whisper?
Apache SkyWalking is written in Java and whisper in Python. 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 whisper?
Choose Apache SkyWalking if you want the larger community (24,988 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose whisper if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.