# AWS X-Ray vs Zipkin

**Leader by vioscaleAI score:** AWS X-Ray

| Attribute | AWS X-Ray | Zipkin |
|---|---|---|
| **vioscaleAI score** | 72.1 (63% (medium)) | 45.5 (37% (low)) |
| activity.commits_last_30d | - | 0 |
| adoption.dependent_repos | - | 1,426 |
| adoption.github_stars | - | 17,464 |
| content.faq | `[{"answer":"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. It is indexed under Distributed Tracing Tools.","source":"https://aws.amazon.com/xray/","question":"What is AWS X-Ray?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"AWS X-Ray offers a free tier, so you can start without paying. Pricing changes often, so verify at source before relying on it.","source":"https://aws.amazon.com/xray/","question":"Is AWS X-Ray free?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed browser-based access to AWS X-Ray. That is the extent of what we could verify from public sources, so it may well offer desktop or mobile clients we have not indexed.","source":"https://aws.amazon.com/xray/","question":"What platforms does AWS X-Ray support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have only confirmed a cloud / SaaS deployment for AWS X-Ray, so it appears to be vendor-hosted. If a self-hosted option exists we have not found it documented publicly.","source":"https://aws.amazon.com/xray/","question":"Can AWS X-Ray be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have independently confirmed SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA and GDPR for AWS X-Ray. Certifications we do not list are ones we have not been able to verify from public sources, which is not the same as AWS X-Ray not holding them. Always confirm compliance directly before you rely on it.","source":"https://aws.amazon.com/trust-center/?nc1=f_cc","question":"What security certifications does AWS X-Ray have?","confidence":0.7},{"answer":"AWS X-Ray is available worldwide. Its primary market is the United States. The vendor is headquartered in the United States.","source":"https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/pricing/?nc2=h_pr_ec2","question":"Where is AWS X-Ray available?","confidence":0.75}]` | `[{"answer":"Collects timing and dependency data from instrumented applications to troubleshoot latency issues. Provides a web interface for querying traces by service, operation, tags, or duration, and displays how requests flow through the service architecture. It is indexed under Distributed Tracing Tools.","source":"https://zipkin.io","question":"What is Zipkin?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Zipkin is open source, so it can be self-hosted and used at no licence cost. It is released under the Apache-2.0 licence. Pricing changes often, so verify at source before relying on it.","source":"https://zipkin.io","question":"Is Zipkin free to use?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Zipkin supports the web, macOS and Linux. Platforms we have not confirmed are simply not listed here rather than ruled out.","source":"https://zipkin.io","question":"What platforms does Zipkin support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. Zipkin can be deployed on-premise and self-hosted, so it does not have to run on the vendor's infrastructure.","source":"https://zipkin.io","question":"Can Zipkin be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed 10 integrations for Zipkin, including HTTP, Kafka, Apache ActiveMQ, gRPC, RabbitMQ, Apache Pulsar, Elasticsearch and Apache Cassandra, plus 2 more. This is what we could verify from public sources, so the vendor may support others we have not indexed.","source":"https://zipkin.io","question":"What does Zipkin integrate with?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. Zipkin is published under the Apache-2.0 licence, a permissive licence that generally allows commercial use and modification. Licence terms can change between releases, so verify against the repository for the version you intend to use.","source":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin","question":"Is Zipkin open source?","confidence":0.95}]` |
| deployment.options | `{"cloud":true}` | `{"self_hosted":true}` |
| description.long | A cloud-based monitoring and observability service that centralizes performance data from AWS services and on-premises applications, providing dashboards, automated insights, and distributed tracing capabilities through OpenTelemetry integration. | Zipkin captures detailed request tracking data from distributed systems, stores it using various backends, and provides a UI for searching traces by service, operation, and duration, along with visualization of service dependency diagrams. |
| features.capabilities | `{"hosting":"cloud","trace_role":"backend","service_map":true,"otel_support":"ingest","trace_search":true,"metrics_correlation":true,"auto_instrumentation":"agent"}` | `{"hosting":"self","trace_role":"backend","service_map":true,"trace_search":true,"multi_protocol":true,"storage_backend":"In-memory, Apache Cassandra, Elasticsearch, OpenSearch","auto_instrumentation":"agent"}` |
| integrations.count | - | 9 |
| integrations.list | - | `[{"name":"HTTP"},{"name":"Kafka"},{"name":"Apache ActiveMQ"},{"name":"gRPC"},{"name":"RabbitMQ"},{"name":"Apache Pulsar"},{"name":"Elasticsearch"},{"name":"Apache Cassandra"},{"name":"OpenSearch"},{"name":"Brave"},{"name":"Apache Kafka","category":"messaging","direction":"inbound"}]` |
| language.primary | - | Java |
| license.spdx | - | Apache-2.0 |
| market.availability | `{"primaryMarkets":[],"availabilityScope":"global","availableCountries":[],"notAvailableCountries":[]}` | - |
| platform.support | `{"web":true}` | `{"web":true}` |
| pricing | `{"type":"usage","plans":[{"free":true,"name":"Free tier","features":["3 Custom Dashboards","Automatic Dashboards","Free metrics from AWS services"],"contactSales":false,"includedLimits":{"custom_dashboards":"3","automatic_dashboards":"unlimited","metrics_per_dashboard":"50"}},{"free":false,"name":"OpenTelemetry metrics ingestion","features":["15 months storage included","No API call charges","No per-metric-series charges"],"components":[{"per":{"qty":1,"unit":"GB"},"kind":"metered","amount":0.5,"currency":"USD"}]},{"free":false,"name":"PromQL query API","features":["Console/dashboard queries free"],"components":[{"per":{"qty":1000000,"unit":"samples scanned"},"kind":"metered","amount":0.01,"currency":"USD"}]},{"free":false,"name":"Container Insights with OpenTelemetry","features":["EKS cluster metrics at 30-second granularity","Kubernetes pod/node labels","PromQL querying"],"components":[{"per":{"qty":1,"unit":"GB"},"kind":"metered","amount":0.08,"currency":"USD"}]}],"summary":"Free tier available. Usage-based pricing: $0.50/GB for OpenTelemetry metrics, $0.08/GB for Container Insights, $0.01 per million query samples.","currency":"USD","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://aws.amazon.com/cloudwatch/pricing/","retrievedAt":"2026-10-13T10:31:43.005Z","startingPrice":{"unit":"samples scanned","amount":0.01,"currency":"USD"},"billingPeriods":["month"]}` | `{"type":"open_source","sourceUrl":"https://zipkin.io","retrievedAt":"2026-08-14T15:27:18.245Z"}` |
| pricing.free_tier | yes | yes |
| pricing.model | freemium | open_source |
| pricing.price_level | low | free |
| pricing.starting_price | `{"amount":0.01,"currency":"USD"}` | - |
| pricing.transparent | yes | - |
| release.cadence_days | - | 15 |
| release.history | - | `[{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.6.1","date":"2026-04-08T19:00:52Z","type":"stable","version":"3.6.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.6.0","date":"2026-03-23T21:13:45Z","type":"stable","version":"3.6.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.5.1","date":"2025-04-27T20:51:04Z","type":"stable","version":"3.5.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.5.0","date":"2025-02-16T18:23:14Z","type":"stable","version":"3.5.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.4.4","date":"2025-02-16T17:20:25Z","type":"stable","version":"3.4.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.4.3","date":"2025-01-06T22:48:34Z","type":"stable","version":"3.4.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.4.2","date":"2024-10-08T12:46:38Z","type":"stable","version":"3.4.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.4.1","date":"2024-08-04T06:44:30Z","type":"stable","version":"3.4.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.4.0","date":"2024-05-26T02:06:56Z","type":"stable","version":"3.4.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.3.1","date":"2024-05-25T11:57:58Z","type":"stable","version":"3.3.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.3.0","date":"2024-04-16T17:01:19Z","type":"stable","version":"3.3.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.2.1","date":"2024-04-13T18:22:45Z","type":"stable","version":"3.2.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.2.0","date":"2024-04-13T02:00:36Z","type":"stable","version":"3.2.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.1.1","date":"2024-03-07T07:02:48Z","type":"stable","version":"3.1.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.1.0","date":"2024-02-26T12:33:27Z","type":"stable","version":"3.1.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.0.6","date":"2024-02-09T02:47:27Z","type":"stable","version":"3.0.6"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.0.5","date":"2024-01-25T02:23:59Z","type":"stable","version":"3.0.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.0.4","date":"2024-01-17T19:16:37Z","type":"stable","version":"3.0.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.0.3","date":"2024-01-15T00:55:42Z","type":"stable","version":"3.0.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/openzipkin/zipkin/releases/tag/3.0.2","date":"2024-01-13T10:27:29Z","type":"stable","version":"3.0.2"}]` |
| reliability.status_page | yes | yes |
| security.certifications | `[{"name":"PCI-DSS","status":"active"},{"name":"HIPAA/HITECH","status":"active"},{"name":"FedRAMP","status":"active"},{"name":"GDPR","status":"active"}]` | - |
| security.disclosure_policy | yes | - |
| security.fedramp | yes | - |
| security.gdpr | yes | - |
| security.hipaa | yes | - |
| security.iso27001 | yes | - |
| security.pci | yes | - |
| security.scorecard | - | 4.2 |
| security.soc2 | yes | - |
| security.trust_center | https://aws.amazon.com/security/ https://aws.amazon.com/compliance/ | - |
| security.vulnerabilities | - | `{"count":0,"source":"https://advisories.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/advisories?ecosystem=maven&package_name=io.zipkin.java%3Azipkin-autoconfigure-ui&per_page=100","last_12m":0,"max_severity":null}` |

## Capabilities (Distributed Tracing Tools)

| Capability | AWS X-Ray | Zipkin |
|---|:--:|:--:|
| **Core** |  |  |
| Trace role | Trace backend / store | Trace backend / store |
| **Standards** |  |  |
| OpenTelemetry support | OTLP ingest | - |
| Multi-protocol (Jaeger + Zipkin + OTLP) | - | ✓ |
| **Query** |  |  |
| Trace search / filter by attributes | ✓ | ✓ |
| Service dependency graph | ✓ | ✓ |
| High-cardinality attribute exploration | - | - |
| **Sampling** |  |  |
| Tail-based / dynamic sampling | - | - |
| **Instrumentation** |  |  |
| Auto-instrumentation | Agent-based | Agent-based |
| **Correlation** |  |  |
| Correlate traces with metrics/logs | ✓ | - |
| **Deployment** |  |  |
| Hosting | Cloud only | Self-hosted only |
| **Architecture** |  |  |
| Storage backend | - | In-memory, Apache Cassandra, Elasticsearch, OpenSearch |

*Source: vioscaleAI. Generated 2026-10-16T20:56:25.314Z. "-" = undocumented, not absent.*