Polartrace

Beyond monitoring

AI-powered observability.
Fewer blind spots, faster fixes.

Distributed tracing, request logs, host metrics and alerting your small team can turn on in two commands - without a Datadog-sized bill or a week of YAML.

Start freeRead the docs
Built on OpenTelemetryStart free - no card requiredFree plan: 5 GB/mo, never billed
PolartracevsDatadog

One plan. Two meters. ~60% less.

Same three core products - infrastructure monitoring, APM & distributed tracing, log management - priced as one subscription with two transparent meters instead of a catalog of SKUs.

A 20-host team ingesting 100 GB/month - APM, logs & infrastructure

Line itemPolartrace GrowthDatadog, annual list
Platform & infrastructure$99 - all-in5 hosts + 150 GB included$30020 hosts × $15 Infra Pro
APM & tracingIncludedevery plan, every host$62020 hosts × $31, on top of Infra
Log managementIncluded100 GB under allowance≈ $95ingest + indexing billed separately
Host overage$30015 extra hosts × $20 flat-
Total / month$399~$1,015

Datadog published list rates, annual billing, verified September 2026: Infrastructure Pro $15/host, APM $31/host attached to it, log ingest $0.10/GB plus standard 15-day indexing at $1.70 per million events (about 2 KB per event assumed). Polartrace Growth: $99/mo with 150 GB + 5 hosts included, extra hosts $20/mo flat. Billable hosts are the 95th percentile of daily distinct reporting hosts - published verbatim in our terms.

How the bill is built

Four rules, worked on the same month

Each mechanic takes the 20-host, 100 GB month from the table above and shows what it produces on both invoices.

What one host costs

Datadog prices Infrastructure and APM per host, and its $31 APM rate applies to hosts that also carry Infrastructure Pro. Polartrace charges one flat rate past your included hosts, with APM, logs and host metrics inside it.

Polartrace
  • Extra host, APM + logs + infra included

Growth includes 5 hosts. $16 per host with an annual commitment.

per extra host / month

$20

Datadog
  • Infrastructure Pro $15
  • APM $31

APM at $31 requires Infrastructure Pro or Enterprise on the same host, so the two stack. Standalone APM without infrastructure is $36.

per host / month, before logs

$46

Which host count gets billed

The same month on both sides: 20 hosts every day, one launch day autoscaled to 40. Datadog bills the high-water mark of hourly host counts after dropping only the top 1% of hours, so a day-long spike sets the bill. Polartrace bills the 95th percentile of daily distinct hosts, so it never does.

Polartrace
p95 · 20 hosts

Illustrative month. p95 of daily distinct hosts is published verbatim in our terms.

billed for the month

20 hosts

Datadog
high-water mark · 40 hosts

High Watermark Plan: hourly host counts with the top 1% of hours (about 8 a month) excluded, then the highest remaining reading is billed.

billed for the month

40 hosts

How 100 GB of logs is billed

Datadog bills logs twice, per GB to ingest them and per million events to index them for search. Polartrace has one per-GB price that covers ingest and search, and data under your allowance is free.

Polartrace
  1. 100 GB ingested
  2. Growth allowance, 150 GBincluded
  3. 0 GB over the allowance$0

Past the allowance: $0.35 per GB, ingest and search in one rate ($0.28 annual).

for 100 GB of logs

$0

Datadog
  1. 100 GB ingested
  2. Ingest at $0.10 per GB$10
  3. Index ~50M events at $1.70 per million$85

Assumes about 2 KB per log event. Indexing is billed per event, so the searchable half is the expensive half.

for 100 GB of logs

≈ $95

When usage runs past the allowance

Overage is where bills surprise people. Polartrace warns you three times, waives the first overage invoice and lets you set a cap that pauses ingest. Datadog bills the extra at on-demand rates.

Polartrace

Usage alerts at 80, 100 and 150% of allowance. First overage invoice waived.

past the allowance

Paused at your cap

Datadog

Usage past your commitment bills at on-demand rates: Infrastructure Pro $18 instead of $15 per host, indexed logs $2.55 instead of $1.70 per million events.

past committed volume

Billed on demand

Datadog figures: published list rates with annual billing, verified against datadoghq.com/pricing in September 2026. Polartrace figures: the current published Growth plan. The 30-day host chart is illustrative sample data; every rate shown is real.

See the full comparisonStart free

One signal graph

All your signals.One place to look.

Traces, request logs, host metrics, Kubernetes health and alerts land in one console - already connected, so nobody tabs between four tools to answer “what broke?”.

  • Traces, logs & metrics unified per service
  • Alerts that deep-link to the evidence
  • Kubernetes health beside your services
  • Live in two commands - no YAML
  • Traces
  • Request logs
  • Host metrics
  • Kubernetes
  • Alerts

Polartrace console

30.4k

requests/h - traced, logged and monitored across 12 services

From alert to root cause

See beyond the alert.Fix the exact query.

The alert links to the breach. The trace shows the database call that timed out. The request log carries the error and its stack. Minutes from page to patch - before customers notice.

  • Alerts deep-link into the console
  • Span waterfall with real timings
  • Log ↔ trace correlation (Node.js)
  • Recovery notified automatically
p99 latency · payments-api1.24 s · breach > 800 ms

trace 4f2a91

waterfall

  • checkout-api · POST /checkout1.32 s
  • payments-api · charge1.24 s
  • PostgreSQL · UPDATE payments1.18 s

request log

Node.js

ERROR payment gateway timeout after 1100 ms

trace_id=4f2a91 · stack trace attached

Kubernetes monitoring

See beyond the service.Watch the whole cluster.

The read-only cluster agent snapshots nodes, pods, workloads and HPA state, and streams Kubernetes events with warning reasons - right beside the services those pods run. Setup is guided from the console's integration wizard.

  • Nodes, pods, workloads & HPA snapshots
  • Events grouped by warning reason
  • Monitors on pod restarts & node health
  • Opt-in container log collection
prod-cluster4 nodes · 38/40 pods

Cluster health

Nodes ready
4 / 4
Restarts (1h)
3
CPU of capacity
61%

Pods by status

ReadyPendingCrashLoop

Kubernetes events

warnings by reason

  • BackOffpayments-api-7d9fwarning
  • Unhealthycheckout-api-5c2awarning
  • Scheduledinventory-api-9b1enormal
Free plan: 5 GB/month - never billed

A platform fee and two meters. That's the whole model.

Every plan includes tracing, logs, metrics and alerting. You pay for data and hosts past your allowance - at rates printed on the pricing page, with a spend cap you set.

Start freeSee full pricing

No card required · every rate published · first overage invoice waived

Running Datadog today? See what the same workload costs here

Schedule a demo

See Polartrace on your stack.

Thirty minutes with the team that builds it. Tell us when works for you and what you run - we'll come prepared.

Schedule a demoWrite to us instead

Opens our Calendly page in a new tab - pick a 30-minute slot in your timezone, no account needed.

A 30-minute call, on your agenda

  • A live walkthrough of the console
  • Pricing, plans and what your workload would cost
  • Migration questions - including from Datadog

Prefer to skip the call? The free plan is 5 GB/month, never billed - two commands and you're live.