# Grafana Tempo vs OpenTelemetry

| Attribute | Grafana Tempo | OpenTelemetry |
|---|---|---|
| **vioscaleAI score** | 63.6 (58% (medium)) | 68.6 (46% (low)) |
| activity.commits_last_30d | 100 | 100 |
| adoption.dependent_repos | 73 | - |
| adoption.github_stars | 5,527 | 7,657 |
| adoption.package_downloads_weekly | - | 136,546,252 |
| content.faq | `[{"answer":"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. It is indexed under Distributed Tracing Tools.","source":"https://grafana.com/oss/tempo/","question":"What is Grafana Tempo?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Grafana Tempo is open source, so it can be self-hosted and used at no licence cost. It is released under the AGPL-3.0 licence. A commercial or hosted edition starts at $19 per month. Prices are published openly on the vendor's own pricing page. Pricing changes often, so verify at source before relying on it.","source":"https://grafana.com/oss/tempo/","question":"Is Grafana Tempo free to use?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Grafana Tempo supports the web and a command-line interface. Platforms we have not confirmed are simply not listed here rather than ruled out.","source":"https://grafana.com/oss/tempo/","question":"What platforms does Grafana Tempo support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. Grafana Tempo can be deployed cloud / SaaS and self-hosted, so it does not have to run on the vendor's infrastructure.","source":"https://grafana.com/oss/tempo/","question":"Can Grafana Tempo be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed 7 integrations for Grafana Tempo, including Grafana, Prometheus, Loki, Jaeger, Zipkin, OpenTelemetry and OpenCensus. This is what we could verify from public sources, so the vendor may support others we have not indexed.","source":"https://grafana.com/oss/tempo/","question":"What does Grafana Tempo integrate with?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have independently confirmed SOC 2, ISO 27001 and GDPR for Grafana Tempo. Certifications we do not list are ones we have not been able to verify from public sources, which is not the same as Grafana Tempo not holding them. Always confirm compliance directly before you rely on it.","source":"https://trust.grafana.com","question":"What security certifications does Grafana Tempo have?","confidence":0.7},{"answer":"Yes. Grafana Tempo is published under the AGPL-3.0 licence, a copyleft licence, so check its terms before embedding it in a closed-source product. Licence terms can change between releases, so verify against the repository for the version you intend to use.","source":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo","question":"Is Grafana Tempo open source?","confidence":0.95}]` | `[{"answer":"A standardized platform for instrumenting applications to collect traces, metrics, and logs. Data is collected through language-specific SDKs and services, then exported to any observability backend without requiring application code changes. It is indexed under Distributed Tracing Tools.","source":"https://opentelemetry.io","question":"What is OpenTelemetry?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"OpenTelemetry 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://opentelemetry.io","question":"Is OpenTelemetry free to use?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"OpenTelemetry supports a command-line interface. Platforms we have not confirmed are simply not listed here rather than ruled out.","source":"https://opentelemetry.io","question":"What platforms does OpenTelemetry support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. OpenTelemetry can be deployed cloud / SaaS, hybrid, on-premise and self-hosted, so it does not have to run on the vendor's infrastructure.","source":"https://opentelemetry.io","question":"Can OpenTelemetry be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed 3 integrations for OpenTelemetry, including Jaeger, Prometheus and Zipkin. This is what we could verify from public sources, so the vendor may support others we have not indexed.","source":"https://opentelemetry.io","question":"What does OpenTelemetry integrate with?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have independently confirmed GDPR for OpenTelemetry. Certifications we do not list are ones we have not been able to verify from public sources, which is not the same as OpenTelemetry not holding them. Always confirm compliance directly before you rely on it.","source":"https://opentelemetry.io/bn/docs/security/handling-sensitive-data/","question":"What security certifications does OpenTelemetry have?","confidence":0.7},{"answer":"Yes. OpenTelemetry 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/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector","question":"Is OpenTelemetry open source?","confidence":0.95}]` |
| deployment.options | `{"cloud":true,"on_prem":true,"self_hosted":true}` | `{"cloud":true,"hybrid":true,"on_prem":true}` |
| description.long | An open-source distributed tracing platform that stores trace data using affordable object storage rather than specialized databases, making it simpler and cheaper to operate while integrating with Grafana and other observability tools. | OpenTelemetry is an open-source framework that equips developers with SDKs, libraries, agents, and collector services to capture distributed traces, metrics, and logs from applications. It enables vendor-neutral observability by allowing teams to instrument code once and export telemetry data to any backend system without vendor lock-in. |
| features.capabilities | `{"hosting":"both","trace_role":"backend","service_map":true,"otel_support":"ingest","trace_search":true,"multi_protocol":true,"storage_backend":"object storage","high_cardinality":true,"metrics_correlation":true}` | `{"apm":true,"logs":true,"hosting":"both","metrics":true,"tracing":true,"trace_role":"platform","otel_native":true,"service_map":true,"otel_support":"native","trace_search":true,"multi_protocol":true,"metrics_correlation":true,"auto_instrumentation":"agent"}` |
| integrations.count | 10 | 2 |
| integrations.list | `[{"name":"Grafana"},{"name":"Prometheus"},{"name":"Loki"},{"name":"Jaeger"},{"name":"Zipkin"},{"name":"OpenTelemetry"},{"name":"OpenCensus"},{"name":"Kafka","native":true,"direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Amazon S3","category":"storage"},{"name":"Google Cloud Storage","category":"storage"},{"name":"Microsoft Azure","category":"storage"}]` | `[{"name":"Jaeger"},{"name":"Prometheus"},{"name":"Zipkin"}]` |
| language.primary | Go | Go |
| license.spdx | AGPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| market.availability | - | `{"primaryMarkets":[],"availabilityScope":"global","availableCountries":[],"notAvailableCountries":[]}` |
| platform.support | `{"cli":true,"web":true,"linux":true}` | `{"windows":true}` |
| pricing | `{"type":"hybrid","plans":[{"free":true,"name":"Open Source","description":"Grafana Tempo open source (AGPLv3)","contactSales":false},{"free":false,"name":"Grafana Cloud Pro","features":["Platform fee includes limited trace retention and usage","30 days retention for traces","8x5 email support"],"components":[{"kind":"fixed","amount":19,"period":"month","currency":"USD"}],"contactSales":false},{"free":false,"name":"Grafana Cloud Enterprise","features":["Custom retention","Premium support","Deployment flexibility (Public Cloud, Federal Cloud, Bring Your Own Cloud)"],"commitment":"annual","components":[{"kind":"fixed","amount":25000,"period":"year","currency":"USD"}],"contactSales":true}],"summary":"Open source (free). Grafana Cloud integration from $19/month or $25k/year enterprise.","currency":"USD","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://grafana.com/oss/tempo/","retrievedAt":"2026-08-01T14:57:40.524Z","startingPrice":{"amount":19,"period":"month","currency":"USD"},"billingPeriods":["month","year"]}` | `{"type":"open_source","sourceUrl":"https://opentelemetry.io","retrievedAt":"2026-08-24T22:37:05.387Z"}` |
| pricing.free_tier | yes | yes |
| pricing.model | freemium | commercial |
| pricing.price_level | low | free |
| pricing.transparent | yes | yes |
| release.cadence_days | 11 | 13 |
| release.history | `[{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v3.1.0","date":"2026-09-29T17:06:39Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.1.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v3.1.0-rc.1","date":"2026-09-17T17:22:52Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v3.1.0-rc.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v3.0.3","date":"2026-08-13T20:37:13Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.0.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.10.8","date":"2026-08-13T20:37:12Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.8"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.9.5","date":"2026-08-13T20:37:04Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.9.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.9.4","date":"2026-07-24T12:29:33Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.9.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.10.7","date":"2026-06-12T16:28:23Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.7"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v3.0.2","date":"2026-06-09T16:30:31Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.0.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.10.6","date":"2026-06-08T21:43:32Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.6"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v3.0.0","date":"2026-05-28T15:09:13Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.0.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v3.0.0-rc.1","date":"2026-05-06T15:23:02Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v3.0.0-rc.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.10.5","date":"2026-04-23T18:14:34Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.9.2","date":"2026-04-23T22:24:52Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.9.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.8.4","date":"2026-04-23T22:25:22Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.8.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.10.4","date":"2026-04-13T11:20:01Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.10.3","date":"2026-03-17T17:52:06Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.10.2","date":"2026-03-12T15:04:28Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.10.1","date":"2026-02-17T11:49:56Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.10.0","date":"2026-01-26T17:59:35Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.10.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/grafana/tempo/releases/tag/v2.8.3","date":"2026-01-20T19:47:32Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.8.3"}]` | `[{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.163.0","date":"2026-10-14T02:03:50Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.163.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.162.0","date":"2026-09-28T14:09:31Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.162.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.161.0","date":"2026-09-14T22:49:14Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.161.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.160.0","date":"2026-09-02T14:38:58Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.160.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.159.0","date":"2026-08-17T17:37:33Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.159.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.158.0","date":"2026-08-04T13:44:21Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.158.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.157.0","date":"2026-07-21T12:38:34Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.157.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.156.0","date":"2026-07-07T07:29:34Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.156.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.155.0","date":"2026-06-23T16:56:18Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.155.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.154.0","date":"2026-06-08T23:51:21Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.154.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.153.0","date":"2026-05-25T08:09:17Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.153.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.152.1","date":"2026-05-19T19:53:43Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.152.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.152.0","date":"2026-05-11T11:48:19Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.152.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.151.0","date":"2026-04-28T18:57:13Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.151.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.150.0","date":"2026-04-13T11:06:56Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.150.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.149.0","date":"2026-03-31T13:43:22Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.149.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.148.0","date":"2026-03-17T13:42:51Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.148.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.147.0","date":"2026-03-02T15:09:00Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.147.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.146.1","date":"2026-02-18T13:48:23Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.146.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-collector/releases/tag/v0.146.0","date":"2026-02-17T21:22:48Z","type":"stable","version":"v0.146.0"}]` |
| reliability.status_page | yes | yes |
| security.disclosure_policy | yes | yes |
| security.fedramp | yes | - |
| security.gdpr | yes | yes |
| security.iso27001 | yes | - |
| security.pci | yes | - |
| security.scorecard | 7.4 | 7.9 |
| security.soc2 | yes | - |
| security.trust_center | https://grafana.com/security/hall-of-fame/issue_35/ | https://opentelemetry.io/bn/docs/zero-code/obi/security/ |
| security.vulnerabilities | `{"count":3,"source":"https://advisories.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/advisories?ecosystem=go&package_name=github.com%2Fgrafana%2Ftempo&per_page=100","last_12m":3,"max_severity":"HIGH"}` | - |

## Capabilities (Distributed Tracing Tools)

| Capability | Grafana Tempo | OpenTelemetry |
|---|:--:|:--:|
| **Core** |  |  |
| Trace role | Trace backend / store | SaaS platform |
| **Standards** |  |  |
| OpenTelemetry support | OTLP ingest | OTel-native |
| 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 |
| **Correlation** |  |  |
| Correlate traces with metrics/logs | ✓ | ✓ |
| **Deployment** |  |  |
| Hosting | Cloud + self-hosted | Cloud + self-hosted |
| **Architecture** |  |  |
| Storage backend | object storage | - |

*Source: vioscaleAI. Generated 2026-10-16T19:22:33.858Z. "-" = undocumented, not absent.*