Management And Observability — small scale stack.
For each requirement below, pick the option that fits your build — recommended first, then free and cheaper alternatives — or skip what your project doesn't need. Tap the info icon next to any requirement to see why it matters.
Monitoring Platform (APM & Infrastructure)
Tells you when things break and why. You cannot fix what you cannot see — this is how you keep downtime short.Pricing & free-tier limitsGrafana Cloud Free: 10k metrics series, 50GB logs, 50GB traces, 500 synthetic checks, 3 users. Pro $8/user/mo: 15k series, 100GB logs, 30d retention. Datadog $15/host/mo + $0.10/container/mo, $1.70/1M custom metrics overage, $0.10/GB logs. New Relic Free 100GB ingest/mo then $0.30/GB, 1 full user free.
Logging Platform / Log Management
Tells you when things break and why. You cannot fix what you cannot see — this is how you keep downtime short.Pricing & free-tier limitsLoki OSS Free unlimited self-host (S3 $0.023/GB). Grafana Cloud Free 50GB logs/mo then $0.50/GB. CloudWatch $0.50/GB ingested, $0.03/GB/mo archived, $0.005/GB query scanned. Datadog $0.10/GB ingested + $1.70/1M events, 15d retention incl then $0.10/GB/mo extended. Sumo Logic Free 1GB/day then $3.00/GB.
Distributed Tracing Platform
Tells you when things break and why. You cannot fix what you cannot see — this is how you keep downtime short.Pricing & free-tier limitsJaeger/Tempo OSS Free unlimited self-host. Grafana Cloud Free 50GB traces/mo then $0.50/GB. Honeycomb Free 20M events/mo (~20GB), then $0.01/1k events + $0.10/GB retention. Datadog APM $31/host/mo includes unlimited APM hosts, $1.70/1M indexed spans overage. Dynatrace $69/host/mo Full-Stack.
Metrics Database / Time Series DB
Persistent storage for your app’s data — users, products, orders. The single most important architectural decision for most projects.Pricing & free-tier limitsPrometheus OSS Free self-host unlimited local disk. VictoriaMetrics OSS Free, Cloud Free 10GB storage + 1M active series, then $10/mo Starter 10GB extra. Grafana Mimir Cloud Free 10k series then $8 per 1k series over. Datadog $1.70/1M custom metrics/mo.
Alerting & On-Call Management
Tells you when things break and why. You cannot fix what you cannot see — this is how you keep downtime short.Pricing & free-tier limitsAlertmanager + Grafana OnCall OSS Free unlimited alerts self-host. Grafana Cloud Free 1k alert notifications. Better Stack Free 10 monitors, 3 on-call users, $29/mo Team unlimited alerts + $0.01/SMS. PagerDuty Free 5 users 1k API calls, Professional $29/user/mo, Business $41/user/mo. Opsgenie $23/user/mo after 5 free users.
Dashboarding / Visualization Platform
A piece of your stack you may or may not need, depending on scope. Pick the option that fits — or skip it if your project doesn’t require this capability yet.Pricing & free-tier limitsGrafana OSS Free unlimited dashboards self-host. Grafana Cloud Free 10k metrics series + 3 users + 5 dashboards, Pro $8/user/mo unlimited dashboards 13mo retention. Datadog dashboards included with $15/host Infra, no per-dashboard fee.
Configuration Management / IaC Orchestration
A piece of your stack you may or may not need, depending on scope. Pick the option that fits — or skip it if your project doesn’t require this capability yet.Pricing & free-tier limitsAnsible OSS Free unlimited nodes self-host. Terraform OSS/OpenTofu Free. Terraform Cloud Free 500 managed resources, 1 concurrent run, then Team $70/mo (2026 list $149/mo for 5 users) + $0.00014/resource/hour over. Pulumi Free 1 stack, Individual $50/mo Team 10 stacks. AAP $10k/yr Starter list $13,750/yr 2026 ~ $30k/yr standard 100 nodes.
Cost Management / FinOps Platform
A piece of your stack you may or may not need, depending on scope. Pick the option that fits — or skip it if your project doesn’t require this capability yet.Pricing & free-tier limitsOpenCost Free OSS unlimited clusters self-host. Kubecost Free OSS 1 cluster, Cloud Free 1 cluster. Vantage Free up to $2k/mo cloud spend tracked, Starter $100/mo up to $20k spend + 0.5% overage. Infracost OSS Free, Cloud $50/mo Pro $500/mo Team. CloudHealth $15k/yr minimum $1,250/mo, no per-GB overage.
OpenTelemetry Collector / Instrumentation
A piece of your stack you may or may not need, depending on scope. Pick the option that fits — or skip it if your project doesn’t require this capability yet.Pricing & free-tier limitsOTel Collector OSS Free unlimited data self-host. Grafana Alloy OSS Free unlimited, Cloud included in free logs/metrics. Datadog OTel ingestion $15/host Infra or $31/host APM includes unlimited OTel traces. No extra per-span if within host license.
Synthetic Monitoring / Uptime Checks
Tells you when things break and why. You cannot fix what you cannot see — this is how you keep downtime short.Pricing & free-tier limitsUptime Kuma OSS Free unlimited checks self-host. Blackbox Exporter OSS Free. Grafana Cloud Free 500 synthetic checks, Starter 100k checks $29/mo then $0.001/check over. Checkly Free 10k checks/mo, $32/mo Team 50k checks + $0.001 over. Datadog Synthetics $5/1k API tests, $12/1k Browser tests/mo.
Error Tracking / Crash Reporting
Tells you when things break and why. You cannot fix what you cannot see — this is how you keep downtime short.Pricing & free-tier limitsGlitchTip OSS Free unlimited errors self-host. Sentry Self-host OSS Free unlimited (requires Postgres/Redis). Sentry Cloud Free 5k errors/mo + 10k transactions, Team $26/mo 50k errors + $0.0004/event over. Datadog Error Tracking included with APM $31/host/mo.
Kubernetes Cost Allocation
A piece of your stack you may or may not need, depending on scope. Pick the option that fits — or skip it if your project doesn’t require this capability yet.Pricing & free-tier limitsOpenCost OSS Free unlimited cost allocation self-host. Kubecost OSS Free single cluster unlimited pods. Kubecost Cloud Free 1 cluster $0, Team $299/mo up to 10 clusters then $0.02/vCPU-hr over. Enterprise $30k/yr up to 100 clusters $50k/yr unlimited.
Governance / Policy Engine (Admission Control)
A piece of your stack you may or may not need, depending on scope. Pick the option that fits — or skip it if your project doesn’t require this capability yet.Pricing & free-tier limitsOPA/Kyverno/Gatekeeper OSS Free unlimited policies self-host. Nirmata Cloud Free 10 policies 1 cluster, $500/mo Team 50 policies. Styra DAS Free 5 OPA instances 1k decisions/min, Pro $250/mo 10k decisions/min then $0.10/1k decisions. Vanta $12k/yr Starter $15k/yr SOC2+.
Multi-Cloud Operations Control Plane
A piece of your stack you may or may not need, depending on scope. Pick the option that fits — or skip it if your project doesn’t require this capability yet.Pricing & free-tier limitsCrossplane OSS Free unlimited managed resources self-host. Terraform Cloud Free 500 resources Team $70/mo (2026 $149/mo) unlimited resources pay per run $0.00014/r-h. Upbound Cloud Free 3 control planes 1k resources, Team $500/mo 10 planes. Spacelift Free 1 stack $0, Team $149/mo unlimited + $0.15/credit.
Terraform State Management / IaC Backend
Where your code actually runs and serves requests. Picking the right host affects speed, scaling, and how much ops work you do.Pricing & free-tier limitsS3 backend Free minus AWS: S3 $0.023/GB/mo + DynamoDB free tier 25 RCU/WCU. Terraform Cloud Free 500 resources 5 users, Team $70/mo ($149/mo 2026) 10 concurrent runs. Business $299/user/mo includes SSO + Sentinel. Scalr Free 100 runs/mo then $99/mo Team.
Status Page / Incident Communication
Tells you when things break and why. You cannot fix what you cannot see — this is how you keep downtime short.Pricing & free-tier limitsCState OSS + Better Stack Free 1 status page 10 subscribers. Instatus Free 1 page 100 subscribers, Starter $29/mo 500 subscribers $0.05/sub over. Statuspage $29/mo Hobby 100 subs, Startup $99/mo 250 subs, $399/mo Growth 1000 subs, Enterprise $899/mo 5000 subs + $0.05 extra.
Log Archival & Long-term Retention
Tells you when things break and why. You cannot fix what you cannot see — this is how you keep downtime short.Pricing & free-tier limitsS3 Standard $0.023/GB/mo, Glacier Instant $0.004/GB, Deep Archive $0.00099/GB. CloudWatch Archive $0.03/GB/mo storage + $0.50/GB ingested. Thanos OSS Free unlimited retention. Grafana Cloud Pro retention 13mo included then $0.50/GB/mo over. Datadog extended retention $0.10/GB/mo after 15d, rehydrate $0.05/GB scanned.
Service Map / Dependency Mapping
A piece of your stack you may or may not need, depending on scope. Pick the option that fits — or skip it if your project doesn’t require this capability yet.Pricing & free-tier limitsKiali/Jaeger Service Graph OSS Free self-host unlimited services. New Relic Service Maps included Free 100GB ingest then $0.30/GB. Datadog Service Map included with APM $31/host/mo. Dynatrace Smartscape included $69/host Full-Stack, overage $0.04/1k traversed spans.
Incident Management Platform
A piece of your stack you may or may not need, depending on scope. Pick the option that fits — or skip it if your project doesn’t require this capability yet.Pricing & free-tier limitsGrafana Incident OSS Free unlimited incidents self-host. Grafana Cloud includes. Incident.io Free 2 incidents/mo 5 users, Team $199/mo unlimited $0 per extra. Rootly Free 5 users, $499/mo Team. PagerDuty Incident $29/user/mo Pro $41. Atlassian JSM Free 3 agents, Standard $20/agent/mo, Premium $40/agent.
How this small scale management and observability checklist works.
Each requirement below is something a small scale management and observability build typically needs. Pick one of the four researched options — recommended, free, cheaper or paid — add your own with "Other", or skip the requirement if your project doesn't need it. Nothing is mandatory; the plan on the right tracks what you've decided so nothing gets forgotten.
Your picks are saved in this browser automatically, so you can come back anytime. Options are researched per build level and refreshed as vendors change their plans — always verify details on the provider's page before committing.