head to head · open source
jaeger vs transmittable-thread-local
jaeger has 23,223 GitHub stars, 3,122 forks, 547 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. transmittable-thread-local has 8,308 stars, 1,723 forks, 57 open issues and last shipped 3 months ago. jaeger leads on adoption by 180% (23,223 vs 8,308 stars). jaeger is written in Go under Apache-2.0; transmittable-thread-local is written in Java under Apache-2.0. jaeger has attracted 13% as many forks as stars, transmittable-thread-local 21%. jaeger was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (distributed-tracing), 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
| jaeger | transmittable-thread-local | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 23K | ★ 8.3K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Java |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-06-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.1K | ⑂ 1.7K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick jaeger if
- You weight community size — 23K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick transmittable-thread-local if
- You want the transmittable-thread-local feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You evaluated both and transmittable-thread-local fits your workflow better
About jaeger
Jaeger is a distributed tracing platform hosted by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF), where it graduated as the 7th top level project in October 2019. It was originally created by Uber Technologies and then donated to the CNCF. The project is written in Go and released under the Apache 2.0 license, and it lives in the OpenTelemetry and observability ecosystem: it consumes traces from OpenTelemetry SDKs and reuses components from the OpenTelemetry Collector. Its repository carries topics including cncf, distributed tracing, jaeger, observability, opentelemetry and tracing, and the project is openly gove…
read the full jaeger overview →
About transmittable-thread-local
TransmittableThreadLocal (TTL) is a small, zero dependency Java library from Alibaba that provides an enhanced InheritableThreadLocal capable of transmitting values between threads even when those threads are pooled and reused. It lives in the Java ecosystem and targets framework and middleware developers who need reliable context propagation across asynchronous execution boundaries. The library is Apache 2.0 licensed, roughly 1000 SLOC, and supports Java 6 through 21.
read the full transmittable-thread-local overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is jaeger or transmittable-thread-local more popular?
jaeger has 23,223 GitHub stars and transmittable-thread-local has 8,308. jaeger has the larger community by that measure.
Are jaeger and transmittable-thread-local free?
Both are open source. jaeger is licensed under Apache-2.0 and transmittable-thread-local under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between jaeger and transmittable-thread-local?
jaeger is written in Go and transmittable-thread-local in Java. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, jaeger or transmittable-thread-local?
Choose jaeger if you want the larger community (23,223 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose transmittable-thread-local if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.