AWS X-Ray vs Grafana Tempo
No clear leader: AWS X-Ray (63.6) and Grafana Tempo (62.9) are within the 5-point margin; treat as a tie. The attribute-by-attribute breakdown below, with a source and date on every value, is the honest way to compare them.
Capabilities
Feature-by-feature on the axes that matter for distributed tracing tools. “-” means undocumented, not absent.
What each one is
The product in its own terms, so the numbers below have context.
AWS X-Ray
Amazon CloudWatch Application Signals is an APM solution providing automatic instrumentation and observability for distributed applications across AWS services with prebuilt dashboards, service mapping, and AI-powered troubleshooting.
Grafana Tempo
Grafana Tempo is an open-source distributed tracing backend designed for high-scale trace collection using only object storage, integrating with Grafana, Prometheus, and Loki. It supports industry-standard tracing protocols and eliminates the need for expensive database infrastructure.
Pricing
List pricing as published by each vendor, with the date we read it. Always verify at the source before you buy.
Grafana Tempo
Open source (free). Grafana Cloud integration from $19/month or $25k/year enterprise.
- Open SourceFree
- Grafana Cloud Pro$19/mo
- Platform fee includes limited trace retention and usage
- 30 days retention for traces
- 8x5 email support
- Grafana Cloud EnterpriseContact sales
- Custom retention
- Premium support
- Deployment flexibility (Public Cloud, Federal Cloud, Bring Your Own Cloud)
Platform & deployment
Where each product runs and how it can be hosted. A dash means undocumented, not unsupported.
Integrations
What each product connects to. Counts come from the vendor's own integration directory where one exists.
AWS X-Ray
Not documented yet.
Grafana Tempo
- Grafana
- Prometheus
- Loki
- Jaeger
- Zipkin
- OpenTelemetry
- OpenCensus
Comparison generated from independently-sourced facts. Every value links to its source and retrieval date. See the method.