head to head · open source
monolog vs pyroscope
monolog has 21,404 GitHub stars, 1,921 forks, 3 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. pyroscope has 11,710 stars, 833 forks, 400 open issues and last shipped yesterday. monolog leads on adoption by 83% (21,404 vs 11,710 stars). monolog is written in PHP under MIT; pyroscope is written in Go under AGPL-3.0. monolog has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, pyroscope 7%. pyroscope was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (hacktoberfest), 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
| monolog | pyroscope | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 21K | ★ 12K |
| License | MIT | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | PHP | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-01 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.9K | ⑂ 833 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick monolog if
- You weight community size — 21K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick pyroscope if
- You want the pyroscope feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and pyroscope fits your workflow better
About monolog
Monolog Logging for PHP Note This is the documentation for Monolog 3.x , if you are using older releases see the documentation for Monolog 2.x or Monolog 1.x Monolog sends your logs to files, sockets, inboxes, databases and various web services. See the complete list of handlers below. Special handlers allow you to build advanced logging strategies. This library implements the PSR 3 interface that you can type hint against in your own libraries to keep a maximum of interoperability. You can also use it in your applications to make sure you can always use another compatible logger at a later time. As of 1.11.0…
read the full monolog overview →
About pyroscope
🎉 Announcement: Pyroscope 2.0 is here! Pyroscope 2.0 makes the new v2 architecture the default. Profiles are written directly to object storage, removing the need for in memory ingesters and local disks simplifying operations and lowering resource usage at scale. Existing v1 deployments can opt in via a flag and migrate without data loss. Read the 2.0 release notes and the v2 architecture overview. Upgrading from v1? See the migration guide. Want the full story? Watch the GrafanaCON 2026 talk Pyroscope 2.0: Continuous Profiling Architecture Deep Dive . What is Grafana Pyroscope? Grafana Pyroscope is a…
read the full pyroscope overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is monolog or pyroscope more popular?
monolog has 21,404 GitHub stars and pyroscope has 11,710. monolog has the larger community by that measure.
Are monolog and pyroscope free?
Both are open source. monolog is licensed under MIT and pyroscope under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between monolog and pyroscope?
monolog is written in PHP and pyroscope 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, monolog or pyroscope?
Choose monolog if you want the larger community (21,404 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose pyroscope if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.