Uptrace
OpenTelemetry APM with two databases and no pretending that is one click.
Technical Profile & Specs
verified 2026-08-14
- Cost
- $0 / forever (Open Source)
- License
- AGPL-3.0
- Hosting Model
- Local or hosted (your machine or their cloud)
- Platforms
- webself-hostedself-host, real ops
- Installation
- Hosted signup, or Docker Compose with Uptrace, ClickHouse, PostgreSQL, Redis, and an OpenTelemetry Collector
- Operational Setup
- Even the small-team Compose deployment is a multi-database stack, and production operation adds collectors, backups, TLS, retention tuning, and ordered upgrades.
- Where Your Data Lives
- Self-hosted telemetry lives in ClickHouse, metadata in PostgreSQL, and transient cache/session data in Redis; Docker uses persistent named volumes.
- The Catch / Trade-off
- It is a capable OpenTelemetry APM, but it is narrower than the hosted Grafana, Prometheus, Loki, and Tempo ecosystem and carries a multi-database self-hosting burden.
Replaces 2 paid apps
Uptrace FAQ
Common questions
Is Uptrace free and open source?+
Uptrace is an open-source tool licensed under AGPL-3.0 that runs on local or hosted. OpenTelemetry APM with two databases and no pretending that is one click.
What paid software does Uptrace replace?+
Uptrace serves as a free replacement for 2 paid SaaS applications: Grafana Cloud, Honeycomb.
How do you install and set up Uptrace?+
Installation: Hosted signup, or Docker Compose with Uptrace, ClickHouse, PostgreSQL, Redis, and an OpenTelemetry Collector. Setup notes: Even the small-team Compose deployment is a multi-database stack, and production operation adds collectors, backups, TLS, retention tuning, and ordered upgrades.
What is the catch or trade-off with Uptrace?+
It is a capable OpenTelemetry APM, but it is narrower than the hosted Grafana, Prometheus, Loki, and Tempo ecosystem and carries a multi-database self-hosting burden.