SHSelfHostIndex

Cortex vs HyperDX

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?
CO Cortex Horizontally scalable, multi-tenant Prometheus as a service VS HyperDX Open-source observability for logs, traces, and session replay
FeatureCortexHyperDX
Deploy effortUnder-an-hour setupUnder-an-hour setup
Health score90 · Excellent93 · Excellent
CategoryMonitoring & StatusMonitoring & Status
LicenseApache-2.0MIT
LanguageGoTypeScript
Setup difficultyHardMedium
Min. RAM1,024 MB1,024 MB
Deploymentdocker, kubernetes, helmdocker, kubernetes, helm
GitHub stars★ 5,865★ 9,912
First released20162023
ReplacesDatadog, Grafana CloudDatadog, Sentry

What are Cortex and HyperDX?

Cortex

Cortex provides a horizontally scalable, highly available, multi-tenant, long-term store for Prometheus metrics. It offers a single API endpoint for querying and writing time series data across clusters.

  • Multi-tenant metrics storage
  • Horizontally scalable
  • Prometheus-compatible API
  • Long-term retention

Read the full Cortex guide →

HyperDX

HyperDX is an open-source observability platform that correlates logs, metrics, traces, and session replays in one place. Built on OpenTelemetry and ClickHouse, it helps developers debug production issues quickly.

  • Correlated logs, traces, and replays
  • OpenTelemetry-native
  • ClickHouse storage
  • Full-text log search

Read the full HyperDX guide →

Cortex vs HyperDX: key differences

Cortex is written in Go, while HyperDX is built with TypeScript. Licensing differs — Apache-2.0 for Cortex versus MIT for HyperDX. Cortex is the more established project (first released 2016), while HyperDX arrived in 2023.

Why pick each one

Choose Cortex if…

  • Built for very large scale
  • True multi-tenancy

Watch out for

  • Operationally heavy
  • Overkill for small setups
Cortex details

Choose HyperDX if…

  • Session replay correlation
  • Developer-focused UX

Watch out for

  • Newer project
  • Requires ClickHouse
HyperDX details

Frequently asked questions

Is Cortex or HyperDX better?

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

Are Cortex and HyperDX free and open-source?

Yes. Cortex is licensed under Apache-2.0 and HyperDX under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Cortex and HyperDX with Docker?

Cortex: yes. HyperDX: yes.

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