Elastic APM vs Helios(2026)
Elastic APM is better for teams that need unified with elasticsearch logs. Helios is the stronger choice if test generation unique. Elastic APM is freemium (from $0) and Helios is freemium (from $0).
Full feature breakdown, pricing details, and pros & cons below.
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Elastic APM
Elastic APM is application performance monitoring built natively into the Elastic Stack (ELK) — trace transactions, profile code, and correlate APM data with logs and infrastructure metrics.
Starting at $0
Visit Elastic APMHelios
Helios provides distributed tracing and testing automation for microservices — capturing real traffic flows to create automated tests and giving developers deep service-level visibility.
Starting at $0
Visit HeliosHow Do Elastic APM and Helios Compare on Features?
| Feature | Elastic APM | Helios |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | freemium | freemium |
| Starting price | $0 | $0 |
| APM traces | ✓ | — |
| Error tracking | ✓ | — |
| Profiling | ✓ | — |
| Infrastructure metrics | ✓ | — |
| Log correlation | ✓ | — |
| Service maps | ✓ | — |
| OpenTelemetry compatible | ✓ | — |
| Distributed tracing | — | ✓ |
| Test generation from traffic | — | ✓ |
| Service dependency map | — | ✓ |
| OTel support | — | ✓ |
| CI/CD integration | — | ✓ |
| Slack notifications | — | ✓ |
| Free tier | — | ✓ |
Elastic APM Pros and Cons vs Helios
Elastic APM
Helios
Should You Use Elastic APM or Helios?
Choose Elastic APM if…
- •Unified with Elasticsearch logs
- •Open source agent
- •Good integration with existing ELK
Choose Helios if…
- •Test generation unique
- •Developer-first
- •Free plan available