head to head · open source
Sentry vs Apache SkyWalking
Sentry has 45,697 GitHub stars, 4,959 forks, 2,265 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Apache SkyWalking has 24,984 stars, 6,630 forks, 41 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Sentry leads on adoption by 83% (45,697 vs 24,984 stars). Sentry is written in Python under a custom or non-standard licence; Apache SkyWalking is written in Java under Apache-2.0. Sentry has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, Apache SkyWalking 27%. Sentry was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (apm), 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
| Sentry | Apache SkyWalking | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 46K | ★ 25K |
| License | Custom / other | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Python | Java |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.0K | ⑂ 6.6K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Sentry if
- You weight community size — 46K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Apache SkyWalking if
- You want the Apache SkyWalking 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 Apache SkyWalking fits your workflow better
About Sentry
Users and logs provide clues. Sentry provides answers. What's Sentry? Sentry is the debugging platform that helps every developer detect, trace, and fix issues. Code breaks, fix it faster. Official Sentry SDKs JavaScript Electron React Native Python Ruby PHP Laravel Go Rust Java/Kotlin Objective C/Swift C\ /F\ C/C++ Dart/Flutter Perl Clojure Elixir Unity Unreal Engine Godot Engine PowerShell Resources Documentation Discussions (Bugs, feature requests, general questions) Discord Contributing Bug Tracker Code Transifex (Translate Sentry\!)
read the full Sentry overview →
About Apache SkyWalking
Apache SkyWalking ========== SkyWalking : an APM (Application Performance Monitoring) system, especially designed for microservices, cloud native and container based architectures. Abstract SkyWalking is an open source APM system that provides monitoring, tracing and diagnosing capabilities for distributed systems in Cloud Native architectures. Distributed Tracing End to end distributed tracing. Service topology analysis, service centric observability and APIs dashboards. Agents for your stack Java, .Net Core, PHP, NodeJS, Golang, LUA, Rust, C++, Client JavaScript and Python agents with active development and…
read the full Apache SkyWalking overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Sentry or Apache SkyWalking more popular?
Sentry has 45,697 GitHub stars and Apache SkyWalking has 24,984. Sentry has the larger community by that measure.
Are Sentry and Apache SkyWalking free?
Both are open source. Sentry has no licence declared in this registry, and Apache SkyWalking is licensed under Apache-2.0. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Sentry and Apache SkyWalking?
Sentry is written in Python and Apache SkyWalking 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, Sentry or Apache SkyWalking?
Choose Sentry if you want the larger community (45,697 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose Apache SkyWalking if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.