head to head · open source
NetData vs opentelemetry-collector
NetData has 81,255 GitHub stars, 6,717 forks, 393 open issues and last shipped yesterday. opentelemetry-collector has 7,729 stars, 2,327 forks, 696 open issues and last shipped yesterday. NetData leads on adoption by 951% (81,255 vs 7,729 stars). NetData is written in Go under GPL-3.0; opentelemetry-collector is written in Go under Apache-2.0. NetData has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, opentelemetry-collector 30%. NetData 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
| NetData | opentelemetry-collector | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 81K | ★ 7.7K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.7K | ⑂ 2.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick NetData if
- You weight community size — 81K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick opentelemetry-collector if
- You want the opentelemetry-collector 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 opentelemetry-collector fits your workflow better
About NetData
X Ray Vision for your infrastructure! Every Metric, Every Second. No BS. Visit our Home Page MENU: WHO WE ARE KEY FEATURES GETTING STARTED HOW IT WORKS FAQ DOCS COMMUNITY CONTRIBUTE LICENSE [!WARNING] People get addicted to Netdata. Once you use it on your systems, there's no going back. WHO WE ARE Netdata is an open source, real time infrastructure monitoring platform. Monitor, detect, and act across your entire infrastructure. Core Advantages: Instant Insights – With Netdata you can access per second metrics and visualizations. Zero Configuration – You can deploy immediately without complex setup. ML Powered –…
read the full NetData overview →
About opentelemetry-collector
Getting Started • Getting Involved • Getting In Touch Vision • Configuration • Monitoring • Security • Package OpenTelemetry Collector The OpenTelemetry Collector offers a vendor agnostic implementation on how to receive, process and export telemetry data. In addition, it removes the need to run, operate and maintain multiple agents/collectors in order to support open source telemetry data formats (e.g. Jaeger, Prometheus, etc.) to multiple open source or commercial back ends. Objectives: Usable: Reasonable default configuration, supports popular protocols, runs and collects out of…
read the full opentelemetry-collector overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is NetData or opentelemetry-collector more popular?
NetData has 81,255 GitHub stars and opentelemetry-collector has 7,729. NetData has the larger community by that measure.
Are NetData and opentelemetry-collector free?
Both are open source. NetData is licensed under GPL-3.0 and opentelemetry-collector under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between NetData and opentelemetry-collector?
NetData is written in Go and opentelemetry-collector 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, NetData or opentelemetry-collector?
Choose NetData if you want the larger community (81,255 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose opentelemetry-collector if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.