DevVersus

SigNoz vs Elastic APM(2026)

SigNoz is better for teams that need open source (mit). Elastic APM is the stronger choice if unified with elasticsearch logs. SigNoz is open-source (from $0) and Elastic APM is freemium (from $0).

Full feature breakdown, pricing details, and pros & cons below.

Affiliate disclosure: Some “Visit” links on this page are affiliate links. We may earn a commission if you sign up — at no extra cost to you. It does not affect our rankings or editorial coverage. Learn more.

SigNoz logo

SigNoz

open-source

SigNoz is an open-source observability platform that unifies distributed tracing, metrics, and logs in a single UI — built on ClickHouse for performance, compatible with OpenTelemetry.

Starting at $0

Visit SigNoz
Elastic APM logo

Elastic APM

freemium

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 APM

How Do SigNoz and Elastic APM Compare on Features?

FeatureSigNozElastic APM
Pricing modelopen-sourcefreemium
Starting price$0$0
Distributed tracing
Metrics monitoring
Log management
OpenTelemetry native
ClickHouse backend
Alerts
Service maps
APM traces
Error tracking
Profiling
Infrastructure metrics
Log correlation
OpenTelemetry compatible

SigNoz Pros and Cons vs Elastic APM

S

SigNoz

+Open source (MIT)
+Three pillars unified
+OTel native
+Free self-hosted
Self-hosting complexity
Cloud pricing less competitive
Less mature than Datadog/Dynatrace
E

Elastic APM

+Unified with Elasticsearch logs
+Open source agent
+Good integration with existing ELK
+Strong community
Complex Elastic setup
Expensive at cloud scale
Observability not Elastic's core focus

Should You Use SigNoz or Elastic APM?

Choose SigNoz if…

  • Open source (MIT)
  • Three pillars unified
  • OTel native

Choose Elastic APM if…

  • Unified with Elasticsearch logs
  • Open source agent
  • Good integration with existing ELK

More Observability & APM Comparisons