head to head · open source
Ollama vs OpenLLMetry
Ollama has 181,161 GitHub stars, 17,917 forks, 3,957 open issues and last shipped yesterday. OpenLLMetry has 7,438 stars, 1,083 forks, 676 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Ollama leads on adoption by 2,336% (181,161 vs 7,438 stars). Ollama is written in Go under MIT; OpenLLMetry is written in Python under Apache-2.0. Ollama has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, OpenLLMetry 15%. Ollama was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (llm), 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
| Ollama | OpenLLMetry | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 181K | ★ 7.4K |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 18K | ⑂ 1.1K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Ollama if
- You weight community size — 181K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick OpenLLMetry if
- You want the OpenLLMetry feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and OpenLLMetry fits your workflow better
About Ollama
Ollama is a Go based, MIT licensed runtime that downloads and runs open source large language models such as DeepSeek, Qwen, Gemma, GLM, MiniMax and gpt oss locally on a user's own machine, and it is aimed at developers and teams that want model inference without routing prompts through a hosted API.
read the full Ollama overview →
About OpenLLMetry
OpenLLMetry is an Apache 2.0 set of OpenTelemetry based extensions, built and maintained by Traceloop, that gives complete observability over Python GenAI and LLM applications, and it is aimed at teams already running LLM workloads that need tracing, metrics, and model monitoring without adopting a proprietary agent.
read the full OpenLLMetry overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Ollama or OpenLLMetry more popular?
Ollama has 181,161 GitHub stars and OpenLLMetry has 7,438. Ollama has the larger community by that measure.
Are Ollama and OpenLLMetry free?
Both are open source. Ollama is licensed under MIT and OpenLLMetry under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Ollama and OpenLLMetry?
Ollama is written in Go and OpenLLMetry in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Ollama or OpenLLMetry?
Choose Ollama if you want the larger community (181,161 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose OpenLLMetry if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.