Jaeger vs Zipkin
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted monitoring & status options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Jaeger | Zipkin |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 97 · Excellent | 91 · Excellent |
| Category | Monitoring & Status | Monitoring & Status |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | Go | Java |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 512 MB | 512 MB |
| Deployment | docker, kubernetes, helm | docker, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 23,234 | ★ 17,465 |
| First released | 2017 | 2015 |
| Replaces | Datadog APM, New Relic | Datadog APM |
What are Jaeger and Zipkin?
Jaeger
Jaeger is a distributed tracing system used to monitor and troubleshoot transactions in complex microservice architectures. It supports trace collection, sampling, and root-cause analysis through a rich UI.
- Distributed transaction tracing
- Service dependency graphs
- Adaptive sampling
- OpenTelemetry compatible
Zipkin
Zipkin is a distributed tracing system that gathers timing data needed to troubleshoot latency problems in service architectures. It collects, stores, and visualizes spans across requests.
- Span collection and storage
- Latency visualization
- Dependency diagrams
- Multiple storage backends
Jaeger vs Zipkin: key differences
Jaeger is written in Go, while Zipkin is built with Java. Zipkin is the more established project (first released 2015), while Jaeger arrived in 2017.
Why pick each one
Choose Jaeger if…
- CNCF graduated project
- Mature and widely adopted
Watch out for
- Storage backend required
- Focused only on traces
Choose Zipkin if…
- Simple to run
- Long-established project
Watch out for
- Tracing only
- Less active than Jaeger
Frequently asked questions
Is Jaeger or Zipkin better?
Neither is universally better. Jaeger has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Jaeger and Zipkin free and open-source?
Yes. Jaeger is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Zipkin under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Jaeger and Zipkin with Docker?
Jaeger: yes. Zipkin: yes.