head to head · open source
Grafana vs opentelemetry-cpp
Grafana has 76,792 GitHub stars, 14,752 forks, 3,326 open issues and last shipped yesterday. opentelemetry-cpp has 1,377 stars, 631 forks, 290 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Grafana leads on adoption by 5,477% (76,792 vs 1,377 stars). Grafana is written in TypeScript under AGPL-3.0; opentelemetry-cpp is written in C++ under Apache-2.0. Grafana has attracted 19% as many forks as stars, opentelemetry-cpp 46%. opentelemetry-cpp 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
| Grafana | opentelemetry-cpp | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 77K | ★ 1.4K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 15K | ⑂ 631 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Grafana if
- You weight community size — 77K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick opentelemetry-cpp if
- You want the opentelemetry-cpp feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and opentelemetry-cpp fits your workflow better
About Grafana
Grafana is an open source observability platform for visualizing metrics, logs, and traces across diverse data sources. It runs in the infrastructure and operations ecosystem, designed for teams needing unified visibility into system behavior without vendor lock in. Built with TypeScript and Go, it provides a composable architecture that integrates with existing toolchains.
read the full Grafana overview →
About opentelemetry-cpp
OpenTelemetry C++ is the official C++ client for OpenTelemetry, the vendor neutral observability framework, and it is built for C++ application owners and library authors who need to emit logs, metrics, and traces from native code.
read the full opentelemetry-cpp overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Grafana or opentelemetry-cpp more popular?
Grafana has 76,792 GitHub stars and opentelemetry-cpp has 1,377. Grafana has the larger community by that measure.
Are Grafana and opentelemetry-cpp free?
Both are open source. Grafana is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and opentelemetry-cpp under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Grafana and opentelemetry-cpp?
Grafana is written in TypeScript and opentelemetry-cpp 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, Grafana or opentelemetry-cpp?
Choose Grafana if you want the larger community (76,792 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose opentelemetry-cpp if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.