AWS X-Ray

AWS X-Ray is a cloud service for following application requests through their dependencies. It suits teams building on AWS that need request-level detail and a service map. Its appeal is AWS-integrated visibility, tempered by 30-day trace retention and a recommended move from its SDK and daemon toward OpenTelemetry.

Overview

X-Ray collects request data for teams to inspect, filter, and analyze when locating application issues or optimization opportunities. A trace can connect request and response details with calls to AWS resources, microservices, databases, and web APIs, helping teams follow a problem across dependencies rather than inspect services separately.

Its service map lays out clients, front-end services, and backend services from trace data. That view can expose bottlenecks and latency spikes, but depends on applications being instrumented to send traces.

Key features

Tracing and AWS integration

Applications can send trace data through X-Ray SDKs or APIs, AWS Distro for OpenTelemetry, or CloudWatch Application Signals. AWS integrations can add tracing headers, transmit data, run the daemon, or instrument requests. For Lambda, the daemon can record invocation details, while the SDK can trace outgoing calls and attach annotations and metadata. This range supports AWS-oriented setups, though teams using the X-Ray SDK or daemon should account for AWS's recommendation to migrate to OpenTelemetry: beginning February 25, 2026, their releases are limited to security fixes.

Sampling and data controls

The SDK's default sampling captures the first request each second and five percent of additional requests; teams can configure sampling rules. Sampling reduces how much request activity is captured, so teams with different investigation needs should tune those rules. Trace data is retained for 30 days, a firm limit for investigations that need longer history.

X-Ray encrypts traces and related data at rest and can use an AWS KMS key, including a customer-managed key. IAM controls API access, with identity-based and resource-based policies. These controls make it a stronger fit for AWS environments that need AWS-managed access and encryption controls than for teams seeking a standalone deployment model; X-Ray is cloud deployed.

Pricing

AWS X-Ray pay-as-you-go costs nothing for 100,000 traces recorded per month and the first 1,000,000 traces retrieved or scanned per month. Additional usage is billed by usage, so the free allowance is useful for modest volumes but does not cap costs as trace activity grows. The pricing note starts from $5, and the paid pricing model means teams should account for charges beyond the free usage.

Platforms

X-Ray is a cloud service, with listed platform support for API, Linux, macOS, web, and Windows. The X-Ray daemon is available for Linux, Windows, and macOS.

Who it's for

X-Ray is best suited to teams operating AWS-backed applications that want request-level investigation, a dependency map, and integration with AWS services such as Lambda. Its sampling controls and IAM policies suit teams that need to shape trace capture and API access. It is less compelling for teams needing trace history beyond 30 days or planning to keep building around the X-Ray SDK and daemon without an OpenTelemetry migration path.

Pros and cons

• Pros: Traces link request details to downstream services and data stores, giving teams a path to find where a request slows.
• Pros: The service map can make bottlenecks and latency spikes easier to locate across front-end and backend services.
• Pros: AWS KMS encryption options and IAM policy controls support AWS-centered security management.
• Cons: Trace retention is limited to 30 days, which constrains longer-term investigations.
• Cons: The SDK's default sample rate omits most additional requests unless rules are changed, so teams must align sampling with their diagnostic needs.
• Cons: SDK and daemon releases are limited to security fixes from February 25, 2026, making migration to OpenTelemetry an important planning consideration.

Alternatives

For a different tracing setup, compare these options in Distributed Tracing Tools.

• Grafana Cloud Application Observability is a freemium option with an always-free plan that includes 2,232 host hours; choose it if that host-hour allowance better fits your initial usage model.
• Tracetest offers a free open-source version; consider it if an open-source tracing tool is your priority.
• Uptrace has a cloud plan with 50 GB free per month, then $0.075/GB, and unlimited users, services, and hosts; choose it if that data-volume model suits your workload.
• Apache SkyWalking is a free, self-hosted open-source observability platform; pick it if you want to run the platform yourself.
• Honeycomb offers a free plan with up to 20M events per month, up to 100M metric data points per month, and two triggers; consider it if those event and metric allowances suit your needs.
• Hubble is a free open-source observability layer that requires Cilium; choose it if your environment already uses Cilium.
• Jaeger is a free, 100% open-source cloud-native project with self-hosted deployment; consider it if self-hosting an open-source tracer is the priority.
• SigNoz offers a self-hosted community plan; choose it if you want to manage the infrastructure, storage, scaling, upgrades, and backups yourself.

Verdict

Choose AWS X-Ray if your team runs applications on AWS and needs request-level tracing, a service map, and AWS access controls in one cloud service. Its AWS integrations are the clearest reason to choose it; the 30-day retention limit and the SDK and daemon's shift toward security-only releases are the reasons to look elsewhere or plan an OpenTelemetry transition.