Is Fly.io or Jaeger better?

Neither clearly leads. Fly.io starts at $29/month and Jaeger at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.

Which is cheaper, Fly.io or Jaeger?

Jaeger has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at $29/month for Fly.io and Free for Jaeger.

Does Fly.io or Jaeger run on more platforms?

Fly.io runs on Web, Api, Docker. Jaeger runs on Linux, Kubernetes, Docker.

Can I use Jaeger for free?

Yes. Jaeger has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Fly.io starts at $29/month.

What is Fly.io best used for?

Fly.io is most often used for deploying containerised applications close to users across regions, running full stack apps and databases on managed machines. Of those, deploying containerised applications close to users across regions and running full stack apps and databases on managed machines are not what Jaeger is typically brought in for.

What can Fly.io do that Jaeger cannot?

Fly.io covers Global deployment, Docker support, Postgres databases, Redis support. Jaeger covers Distributed trace search, Dependency graph, Adaptive sampling, Pluggable storage.

Cloud · head to head

Fly.io vs Jaeger

Fly.io

Cloud

Deploy web applications globally

From: $29/month
Rated: -

Full review Website

Jaeger

Cloud

Open-source end-to-end distributed tracing

From: Free
Rated: -

Full review Website

The short version

Only Jaeger has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
Each has a real cost: Fly.io egress is priced by destination region, from $0.02 per GB in North America and Europe to $0.12 per GB for Africa and India, so the same traffic costs six times more depending on where users are; Jaeger tracing is only as good as the instrumentation, and partial instrumentation produces misleading gaps
They diverge on capability: Fly.io covers Global deployment, Jaeger covers Distributed trace search.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Fly.io and Jaeger actually diverge.

Attributes where Fly.io and Jaeger differ
Attribute	Fly.io	Jaeger
Starting price	$29/month	Free
Pricing model	usage-based	Open source, no licence fee
Free tier	No	Yes
Platforms	Web, Api, Docker	Linux, Kubernetes, Docker
Founded	2020	Unknown

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (Cloud).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Fly.io

Global deployment
Docker support
Postgres databases
Redis support
Auto-scaling
Health checks
Backups
Monitoring

Only in Jaeger

Distributed trace search
Dependency graph
Adaptive sampling
Pluggable storage

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Fly.io

Deploying containerised applications close to users across regionsnot Jaeger
Running full stack apps and databases on managed machinesnot Jaeger

Jaeger

Finding which service in a request path causes the latencynot Fly.io
Understanding real service dependencies rather than the diagram on the wikinot Fly.io
Debugging failures that only appear under production traffic patternsnot Fly.io

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Fly.io

Egress is priced by destination region, from $0.02 per GB in North America and Europe to $0.12 per GB for Africa and India, so the same traffic costs six times more depending on where users are
Stopped machines still bill at $0.15 per GB of root filesystem a month, so a paused service is not a free one
Volumes are billed on provisioned capacity rather than usage, at $0.15 per GB a month
Reservation discounts of 40% require paying a year up front, from $36 to $1,440
Fly Kubernetes is a separate $75 a month per cluster
Dedicated IPv4 addresses are $2 a month each

Jaeger

Tracing is only as good as the instrumentation, and partial instrumentation produces misleading gaps
Storage is the real operational cost: high-volume tracing on Elasticsearch or Cassandra is a cluster to run and pay for
Traces alone, without correlated metrics and logs, leave you switching between tools during an incident

Pricing, plan by plan

Fly.io

$29/month

Pay-as-You-Go$null/mo
- Micro VMs and persistent storage charged by usage
- FlyCTL CLI
- Unlimited users and organizations
Serious Support$29/month
- Access to dedicated engineering team
- All Pay-as-You-Go features
Machine Reservation Blocks$null/mo
- 40% discount on machine usage
- Requires upfront payment for savings
Compliance Package$99/month
- HIPAA compliance
- BAAs
- SOC2 documentation

Jaeger

Free

JaegerFree
- Full functionality
- No usage limits
- Community support

Which should you pick?

Choose Fly.io if

You need global deployment.
You work on Web, Api, Docker.
You also want docker support.

Fly.io review

Choose Jaeger if

You need distributed trace search.
You want to start without paying.
You work on Linux, Kubernetes, Docker.
You also want dependency graph.

Jaeger review

Questions people ask

Is Fly.io or Jaeger better?: Neither clearly leads. Fly.io starts at $29/month and Jaeger at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Fly.io or Jaeger?: Jaeger has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at $29/month for Fly.io and Free for Jaeger.
Does Fly.io or Jaeger run on more platforms?: Fly.io runs on Web, Api, Docker. Jaeger runs on Linux, Kubernetes, Docker.
Can I use Jaeger for free?: Yes. Jaeger has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Fly.io starts at $29/month.
What is Fly.io best used for?: Fly.io is most often used for deploying containerised applications close to users across regions, running full stack apps and databases on managed machines. Of those, deploying containerised applications close to users across regions and running full stack apps and databases on managed machines are not what Jaeger is typically brought in for.
What can Fly.io do that Jaeger cannot?: Fly.io covers Global deployment, Docker support, Postgres databases, Redis support. Jaeger covers Distributed trace search, Dependency graph, Adaptive sampling, Pluggable storage.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Fly.io: Is there a free tier for Fly.io?

Fly.io does not advertise a free tier. The base plan is pay-as-you-go with usage-based pricing for Micro VMs and persistent storage. All users get FlyCTL CLI, unlimited organizations, private networking, SSO, ACLs, and scoped tokens.

Source

Jaeger: Is Jaeger free?

Yes, open source and CNCF-graduated. Costs are the storage backend you run.

Fly.io: How much does Fly.io Serious Support cost?

Serious Support costs 29 USD per month and provides access to a dedicated engineering team while maintaining all pay-as-you-go features for Micro VMs and storage.

Source

Jaeger: Do I use Jaeger or OpenTelemetry?

Both, usually. Instrument with OpenTelemetry and use Jaeger to store and query the traces.

Fly.io: What does Fly.io Compliance Package include?

The Compliance Package is 99 USD per month and includes HIPAA compliance, BAAs, and SOC2 documentation for organizations requiring compliance certifications.

Source

Jaeger: Does Jaeger handle metrics and logs?

No. It is a tracing system. Metrics and logs need Prometheus, Loki or an equivalent.

Fly.io: Does Fly.io offer discounts for upfront commitment?

Yes, Fly.io offers Machine Reservation Blocks with 40% discount on machine usage. This requires upfront payment but applies savings on infrastructure costs.

Source

Fly.io vs Jaeger

Fly.io

Jaeger

The short version

Where they differ

What each one covers

Only in Fly.io

Only in Jaeger

What people use each for

Fly.io

Jaeger

Where each one falls short

Fly.io

Jaeger

Pricing, plan by plan

Fly.io

Jaeger

Which should you pick?

Choose Fly.io if

Choose Jaeger if

Questions people ask

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Related pages

More on Fly.io

More on Jaeger

Keep looking

Other head to heads