vioscaleAI
Comparison

Glowroot vs Instana

On the evidence we track, Instana leads this comparison with a composite score of 60/100. Scores are only directly comparable because these tools share a category; the full breakdown and every source is below.

Glowroot full profile →Instana full profile →
Machine formatsMarkdownJSONGraphQLMarkdown is open. JSON and GraphQL need a free key.
Glowroot50
★Instana60
Score
vioscaleAI score
Glowroot50 / 100medium · 53%
Instana60 / 100low · 41%
Pricing
Free tier
Glowroot✓
Instana✗
Model
Glowrootopen_source
Instanacommercial
Price level
Glowrootfree
Instanamid
Starting price
Glowroot–
Instana$21.20
Transparent
Glowroot✓
Instana✓
Integrations
Count
Glowroot50
Instana300
Security
Disclosure policy
Glowroot–
Instana✓
Gdpr
Glowroot–
Instana✓
Scorecard
Glowroot5.2
Instana–
Soc2
Glowroot–
Instana✓
Vulnerabilities
Reliability
Status page
Glowroot✓
Instana–
Adoption
Dependent repos
Glowroot13
Instana–
Github stars
Glowroot1,358
Instana–
Activity
Commits last 30d
Glowroot10
Instana–
Release
Cadence days
Glowroot27
Instana–
History
Glowroot20 items
Instana–
License
Spdx
GlowrootApache-2.0
Instana–
Language
Primary
GlowrootJava
Instana–
Market
Availability
Glowroot–
InstanaAvailable worldwide
Content
Faq
Glowroot6 items
Instana6 items

Capabilities

Feature-by-feature on the axes that matter for apm tools. “-” means undocumented, not absent.

Instrumentation
Auto-instrumentation
Glowroot✓
Instana✓
Distributed tracing
Glowroot✓
Instana✓
Insight
Service map
Glowroot-
Instana✓
Code / continuous profiling
Glowroot✓
Instana✓
Database monitoring
Glowroot✓
Instana✓
Error analytics
Glowroot✓
Instana✓
Real-user monitoring
Glowroot-
Instana✓
SLO / error-budget tracking
Glowroot-
Instana-
Intelligence
Anomaly / root-cause AI
Glowroot-
Instana✓
Standards
OpenTelemetry support
GlowrootNone
InstanaOTLP ingest
Core
Language agents
GlowrootJava
Instana300+ technologies supported
Deployment
Hosting
GlowrootSelf-hosted only
InstanaCloud + self-hosted

What each one is

The product in its own terms, so the numbers below have context.

Glowroot

A lightweight APM solution for Java applications that helps identify performance bottlenecks and understand application behavior with low overhead and straightforward deployment options.

Independently observed

Instana

Leader

A monitoring and observability platform that automatically discovers and monitors applications and infrastructure, providing real-time full-stack visibility with AI-powered incident investigation and performance optimization.

Independently observed

Pricing

List pricing as published by each vendor, with the date we read it. Always verify at the source before you buy.

Glowroot

Open sourceFree tier

Open source, free

as of verify ↗

Instana

Leader
from $21.20/MVS/moHybrid14-day trial

From $0.03/MVS hour (pay-per-use) or $21.20/MVS/month (SaaS). 14-day free trial available.

  • Try Instana for FreeFree
    • Application monitoring
    • Infrastructure monitoring
    • Log monitoring
    • Digital experience monitoring
    • Microservice visibility
    • +2 more
  • PayPerUseFrom $0.03/MVS hour
    • Infrastructure monitoring (Essentials)
    • Full observability option
    • No commitment
    • Cancel anytime
  • SaaSFrom $21.20/MVS/month
    • Unlimited users
    • Unlimited hosts and scale
    • Service discovery and mapping
    • Distributed end-to-end tracing
    • Serverless monitoring
    • +7 more
  • Self-HostedFrom $385.20/MVS/year
    • Service discovery and mapping
    • Distributed end-to-end tracing
    • Serverless monitoring
    • Container and runtime monitoring
    • Kubernetes monitoring
    • +8 more
as of verify ↗

Platform & deployment

Where each product runs and how it can be hosted. A dash means undocumented, not unsupported.

Platforms
Web
Glowroot✓
Instana✓
Deployment
Cloud / SaaS
Glowroot✗
Instana✓
Self-hosted
Glowroot✓
Instana✓
On-premise
Glowroot✗
Instana✓
Hybrid
Glowroot✗
Instana✓

Integrations

What each product connects to. Counts come from the vendor's own integration directory where one exists.

In common (3)
  • Cassandra
  • MongoDB
  • Redis

Glowroot

39 total - 36 not shared
  • Apache Camel
  • EJB
  • Elasticsearch
  • Grails
  • Hibernate
  • Apache HttpClient
  • Apache HttpAsyncClient
  • AsyncHttpClient
  • OkHttp
  • JavaMail
  • JAX-RS
  • JAX-WS
  • JDBC
  • JMS
  • JSF
  • JSP
  • Kafka
  • JUL
  • Log4j
  • Logback
  • Netty
  • Play Framework
  • Quartz Scheduler
  • Servlets
  • +12 more
Independently observed

Instana

Leader
52 total - 49 not shared
  • ServiceNow
  • AWS
  • Azure
  • Google Cloud
  • Oracle Cloud
  • IBM Cloud
  • Kubernetes
  • VMware Tanzu
  • Cloud Foundry
  • VSphere
  • PostgreSQL
  • MySQL
  • Oracle Database
  • IBM Db2
  • Microsoft SQL Server
  • SAP HANA
  • Apache Spark
  • Hadoop YARN
  • Apache HBase
  • ClickHouse
  • OpenSearch
  • GraphQL
  • AWS EC2
  • AWS RDS
  • +25 more
Independently observed
Still deciding?

Glowroot or Instana: which one depends on you

A composite score cannot know your constraints. Describe them and both get re-weighted against what you actually need, with the evidence behind every position.

Free to run, no account needed to start. How the evaluation works

Comparison generated from independently-sourced facts. Every value links to its source and retrieval date. See the method.