HyperDX vs Prometheus
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted monitoring & status options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
HyperDX
Open-source observability for logs, traces, and session replay
VS
Prometheus
Metrics-based monitoring and alerting toolkit
| Feature | HyperDX | Prometheus |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | ≈5-minute setup |
| Health score | 93 · Excellent | 100 · Excellent |
| Category | Monitoring & Status | Monitoring & Status |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | TypeScript | Go |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 1,024 MB | 512 MB |
| Deployment | docker, kubernetes, helm | docker, binary, helm |
| GitHub stars | ★ 9,912 | ★ 66,196 |
| First released | 2023 | 2015 |
| Replaces | Datadog, Sentry | Datadog |
What are HyperDX and Prometheus?
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
Prometheus
Prometheus is a metrics-based monitoring system and time-series database with a powerful query language and alerting. It targets engineers monitoring cloud-native infrastructure. It is deployed via Docker, binaries, or Helm.
- Pull-based metrics collection
- PromQL query language
- Built-in alerting rules
- Cloud-native standard
HyperDX vs Prometheus: key differences
HyperDX is written in TypeScript, while Prometheus is built with Go. Licensing differs — MIT for HyperDX versus Apache-2.0 for Prometheus. Prometheus is the lighter option, starting around 512 MB of RAM against 1,024 MB for HyperDX. Prometheus is the more established project (first released 2015), while HyperDX arrived in 2023. Prometheus has the considerably larger community, at 66,196 GitHub stars versus 9,912.
Why pick each one
Choose HyperDX if…
- Session replay correlation
- Developer-focused UX
Watch out for
- Newer project
- Requires ClickHouse
Choose Prometheus if…
- Powerful query language
- Reliable and scalable
- Huge ecosystem
Watch out for
- No long-term storage by default
- Dashboards need Grafana
Frequently asked questions
Is HyperDX or Prometheus better?
Neither is universally better. Prometheus has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are HyperDX and Prometheus free and open-source?
Yes. HyperDX is licensed under MIT and Prometheus under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run HyperDX and Prometheus with Docker?
HyperDX: yes. Prometheus: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, HyperDX or Prometheus?
Prometheus has the smaller minimum footprint at 512 MB of RAM, compared to about 1,024 MB for HyperDX. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.