Pinpoint APM vs Grafana Loki

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted monitoring & status options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
FeaturePinpoint APMGrafana Loki
CategoryMonitoring & StatusMonitoring & Status
LicenseApache-2.0AGPL-3.0
LanguageJavaGo
Setup difficultyHardMedium
Min. RAM2,048 MB512 MB
Deploymentdocker, bare-metaldocker, kubernetes, helm
GitHub stars★ 13,855★ 28,687
First released20152018
ReplacesNew Relic, DynatraceSplunk, Datadog Logs

Why pick each one

Choose Pinpoint APM if…

  • Detailed call-stack tracing
  • Good for large JVM systems
Pinpoint APM details

Choose Grafana Loki if…

  • Cheap to run compared to full-text indexers
  • Familiar Prometheus-style labels
Grafana Loki details

Frequently asked questions

Is Pinpoint APM or Grafana Loki better?

Grafana Loki is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler medium setup. Consider Pinpoint APM if its specific feature set fits your needs better.

Are Pinpoint APM and Grafana Loki free and open-source?

Yes. Pinpoint APM is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Grafana Loki under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Pinpoint APM and Grafana Loki with Docker?

Pinpoint APM: yes. Grafana Loki: yes.

Related comparisons