head to head · open source
jaeger vs kubeshark
jaeger has 23,368 GitHub stars, 3,222 forks, 547 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. kubeshark has 12,127 stars, 558 forks, 149 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. jaeger leads on adoption by 93% (23,368 vs 12,127 stars). jaeger is written in Go under Apache-2.0; kubeshark is written in Go under Apache-2.0. jaeger has attracted 14% as many forks as stars, kubeshark 5%. jaeger was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
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 | kubeshark | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 23K | ★ 12K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-03 | 2026-11-01 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.2K | ⑂ 558 |
| 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 kubeshark if
- You want the kubeshark feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and kubeshark fits your workflow better
About jaeger
[![Slack chat][slack img]]( get in touch) [![Unit Tests][ci img]][ci] [![Coverage Status][cov img]][cov] [![Project+Community stats][community badge]][community stats] [![FOSSA Status][fossa img]][fossa] [![OpenSSF Scorecard][openssf img]][openssf] [![OpenSSF Best Practices][openssf bp img]][openssf bp] [![CLOMonitor][clomonitor img]][clomonitor] [![Artifact Hub][artifacthub img]][artifacthub] Jaeger a Distributed Tracing System 💥💥💥 Jaeger v2 is out! Read the blog post and try it out. Quick Start Get Jaeger running in seconds with Docker: For production deployments and more options, see the Getting Started…
read the full jaeger overview →
About kubeshark
Network Observability for SREs & AI Agents Live Demo · Docs Kubeshark indexes cluster wide network traffic at the kernel level using eBPF — delivering instant answers to any query using network, API, and Kubernetes semantics. What you can do: Download Retrospective PCAPs — cluster wide packet captures filtered by nodes, time, workloads, and IPs. Store PCAPs for long term retention and later investigation. Visualize Network Data — explore traffic matching queries with API, Kubernetes, or network semantics through a real time dashboard. See Encrypted Traffic in Plain Text — automatically decrypt TLS/mTLS traffic…
read the full kubeshark overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is jaeger or kubeshark more popular?
jaeger has 23,368 GitHub stars and kubeshark has 12,127. jaeger has the larger community by that measure.
Are jaeger and kubeshark free?
Both are open source. jaeger is licensed under Apache-2.0 and kubeshark under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between jaeger and kubeshark?
jaeger is written in Go and kubeshark in Go. 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 kubeshark?
Choose jaeger if you want the larger community (23,368 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose kubeshark if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.