Who is each tool for?
Ne
New Relic APM
Teams wanting generous free tier with consumption-based pricing
Pr
Prometheus
Teams wanting powerful open-source metrics monitoring with PromQL
Pros and Cons
Ne
New Relic APM
Pros
- Generous free tier (100GB/mo)
- Excellent distributed tracing
- Strong language support
- Transparent pricing model
Cons
- Costs can be unpredictable at scale
- Some advanced features require upgrades
- Agent overhead in some cases
Pr
Prometheus
Pros
- Powerful PromQL query language
- Excellent Kubernetes integration
- Active open-source community
- Pull-based model is firewall-friendly
Cons
- Limited long-term storage by default
- No built-in dashboards (needs Grafana)
- High cardinality can be challenging
Feature Comparison
Feature
Ne
New Relic APMPr
PrometheusAPM
9.5
5
Log Management
7.5
3
Infrastructure Monitoring
8
9
Alerting
8
8.5
Integrations
8.5
8.5
Ease of Use
8.5
7
Support
8
7
Value for Money
8.5
10
Overall Score
8.9
8.9
Pricing
Ne
New Relic APM
Free tier / From $0.30/GB
Pricing varies by data volume and features. Contact New Relic APM for a custom quote.
Pr
Prometheus
Free / Open Source
Pricing varies by data volume and features. Contact Prometheus for a custom quote.
Our Verdict
Both New Relic APM and Prometheus are excellent observability platforms. Both tools score equally at 8.9/10, making them both excellent choices.
