OpenLLMetry vs Ragas
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted self-hosted ai options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | OpenLLMetry | Ragas |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Read-the-docs project |
| Health score | 91 · Excellent | 72 · Good |
| Category | Self-Hosted AI | Self-Hosted AI |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | Python | Python |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 512 MB | 1,024 MB |
| Deployment | docker, source | source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 7,445 | ★ 15,834 |
| First released | 2023 | 2023 |
| Replaces | LangSmith, Datadog LLM Observability | LangSmith |
What are OpenLLMetry and Ragas?
OpenLLMetry
OpenLLMetry is a set of OpenTelemetry extensions from Traceloop that add observability to LLM applications. It instruments calls to model providers and vector databases so traces and metrics can be sent to any self-hosted backend.
- OpenTelemetry-based tracing
- Instruments popular LLM SDKs
- Vendor-neutral export
- Vector database instrumentation
Ragas
Ragas is an open-source framework for evaluating retrieval-augmented generation pipelines. It provides metrics for faithfulness, answer relevancy, and context precision that can be run entirely on self-hosted infrastructure.
- RAG-specific metrics
- Synthetic test set generation
- Framework agnostic
- Local evaluation
OpenLLMetry vs Ragas: key differences
Both projects are written in Python. OpenLLMetry is the lighter option, starting around 512 MB of RAM against 1,024 MB for Ragas. Ragas has the considerably larger community, at 15,834 GitHub stars versus 7,445. OpenLLMetry lists first-class Docker deployment; Ragas does not.
Why pick each one
Choose OpenLLMetry if…
- Released under the Apache-2.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Mature project with 7.4k GitHub stars
- Written in Python
Choose Ragas if…
- Research-backed metrics
- Simple Python API
- Framework integrations
Watch out for
- Metrics need LLM calls
- Frequent API changes
Frequently asked questions
Is OpenLLMetry or Ragas better?
Neither is universally better. Ragas has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are OpenLLMetry and Ragas free and open-source?
Yes. OpenLLMetry is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Ragas under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run OpenLLMetry and Ragas with Docker?
OpenLLMetry: yes. Ragas: check the project docs for container support.
Which is lighter on resources, OpenLLMetry or Ragas?
OpenLLMetry has the smaller minimum footprint at 512 MB of RAM, compared to about 1,024 MB for Ragas. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.