head to head · open source
SigNoz vs qtap
SigNoz has 32,146 GitHub stars, 2,497 forks, 1,557 open issues and last shipped today. qtap has 1,460 stars, 55 forks, 8 open issues and last shipped 9 days ago. SigNoz leads on adoption by 2,102% (32,146 vs 1,460 stars). SigNoz is written in TypeScript under a custom or non-standard licence; qtap is written in C under Apache-2.0. SigNoz has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, qtap 4%. SigNoz was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (go, observability), 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
| SigNoz | qtap | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 32K | ★ 1.5K |
| License | Custom / other | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | C |
| Last push | 2026-09-20 | 2026-09-11 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.5K | ⑂ 55 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick SigNoz if
- You weight community size — 32K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick qtap if
- You want the qtap feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C
- You evaluated both and qtap fits your workflow better
About SigNoz
SigNoz is an open source, OpenTelemetry native observability platform for cloud native applications. It unifies logs, metrics, traces, alerts, and dashboards into a single tool, replacing fragmented monitoring stacks with a correlated signal pipeline. It lives in the observability ecosystem alongside tools like Prometheus, Jaeger, and Grafana, and is positioned as an open alternative to Datadog.
read the full SigNoz overview →
About qtap
Qtap is an Apache 2.0 eBPF agent that intercepts network traffic inside the Linux kernel at the TLS/SSL layer, letting platform engineers, SREs, security auditors, and application developers inspect egress connections and the originating processes without modifying applications, deploying proxies, or managing certificates.
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Frequently asked questions
Is SigNoz or qtap more popular?
SigNoz has 32,146 GitHub stars and qtap has 1,460. SigNoz has the larger community by that measure.
Are SigNoz and qtap free?
Both are open source. SigNoz has no licence declared in this registry, and qtap is licensed under Apache-2.0. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between SigNoz and qtap?
SigNoz is written in TypeScript and qtap in C. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, SigNoz or qtap?
Choose SigNoz if you want the larger community (32,146 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose qtap if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.