What to Use When: OpenTelemetry vs. eBPF
Introduction
In today’s complex and changing IT settings, observability is critical to assure the health and operations of your systems. Understanding what is occurring in your system allows you to rapidly detect and solve issues, enhance performance, prevent problems, and make better decisions. OpenTelemetry with Extended Berkeley Packet Filter (eBPF), both have distinct features, but they address different areas of system monitoring. Understanding their strengths and when to employ them can greatly improve your observability approach.
What is eBPF?
The extended Berkeley Packet Filter, or eBPF, is a technique that allows programs to operate within the Linux kernel without modifying the kernel source code or loading kernel modules. IT teams may use eBPF programs to run code for data collection from apps and infrastructure (in addition to monitoring, they can employ eBPF to enforce security requirements.) Because the code runs inside the kernel, it is extremely efficient. It’s also incredibly secure since eBPF applications are isolated from one another and must pass validations before the kernel enables them to operate.
What is OpenTelemetry?
OpenTelemetry is a vendor-neutral set of tools and frameworks that enterprises use to collect observability data from their applications. IT companies can collect the data they need to monitor and manage nearly any form of software by including OpenTelemetry instrumentation libraries in application code and then monitoring applications with OpenTelemetry-compatible tools.
Comparing OpenTelemetry and eBPF
In general, the answer is that eBPF works best when performance is a key priority and when you lack the development resources to instrument OpenTelemetry inside your applications. You also, again, need to be running your workloads on Linux if you want to use eBPF.
On the other hand, OpenTelemetry makes more sense if you are creating new applications and can design them from the start to support the OpenTelemetry framework. It’s also ideal for IT organizations that need to support both Windows and Linux-based workloads.
Keep in mind, too, that OpenTelemetry and eBPF are not an either-or proposition.
It’s possible to use both of them at the same time, even for the same applications — which you might choose to do if, for example, you’ve already instrumented OpenTelemetry for an app but the resource consumption levels of your monitoring tools are too high. So in this case you may want to offload some of the monitoring work to eBPF programs.
OpenTelemetry vs. eBPF
When you look behind the scenes, you will see that OpenTelemetry and eBPF handle several aspects in different ways. The primary differences between OpenTelemetry and eBPF are:
Implementation
To utilize OpenTelemetry, you must incorporate OpenTelemetry instrumentation into your application. In contrast, eBPF programs operate independently of applications, hence no changes to the applications are required to use eBPF.
Efficiency
In most circumstances, eBPF applications can gather data with less CPU and memory use than OpenTelemetry programs since they operate directly in the kernel.
Compatibility
Currently, eBPF only supports Linux-based workloads. A version of eBPF for Windows is in development, but it is not yet completely developed. OpenTelemetry, on the other hand, is compatible with the vast majority of common operating systems.
Ease of Use
OpenTelemetry is currently more user-friendly than eBPF. This is because OpenTelemetry has been integrated into a large number of application monitoring solutions, but only a few support eBPF. This implies that getting started with eBPF will likely take more work than utilizing OpenTelemetry.
eBPF and OpenTelemetry Integration
OpenTelemetry is a collection of open standards and tools for gathering, exporting, and displaying telemetry data, whereas eBPF offers a potent mechanism for dynamic tracing and analysis within the Linux kernel. Combining eBPF with OpenTelemetry allows you to obtain extensive access to your application’s internals as well as the underlying system with little overhead. This combination allows you to gather fine-grained telemetry data from the kernel and other application layers, giving you a complete picture of your system’s behavior and performance.
When to Use OpenTelemetry?
- Comprehensive Language and Framework Support: OpenTelemetry, with its support for numerous programming languages and frameworks, is appropriate for environments with diverse technological stacks.
- Integration With Existing Tools: OpenTelemetry works well with popular observability tools such as Prometheus for metrics, Jaeger for tracing, and Grafana for visualization, making it an adaptable option for full observability solutions.
When to Use eBPF?
- High Performance and Low Overhead: eBPF is extremely efficient, running customized bytecode within the kernel, resulting in minimal impact on system performance. This makes it ideal for high-throughput settings where performance is crucial.
- Flexibility and Extensibility: The ability to create unique eBPF systems suited to specific monitoring and security requirements offers unequaled flexibility.
Conclusion
The choice between OpenTelemetry and eBPF is based on your individual and organization’s observability requirements. OpenTelemetry is best suited for application-level monitoring, distributed tracing, and settings with multiple technology stacks. On the other hand, eBPF is ideal for providing deep kernel-level visibility, high-performance monitoring, and security enforcement. Understanding the advantages of each tool and its complementary capabilities allows you to develop a complete and efficient observability plan that matches your organizational needs. Whether used separately or together, OpenTelemetry and eBPF provide significant solutions for improving system visibility and performance.
