Updated 30 March 2026

Sentry vs Datadog

Specialized error tracking versus full observability platform. Sentry focuses on errors, crash reporting, performance monitoring, and session replay. Datadog provides infrastructure monitoring, APM, log management, synthetics, RUM, and security monitoring. Different tools for different needs, and many teams use both.

Pricing Models Compared

Sentry (Event-Based)

Developer: Free (5K events/mo, 1 user)

Team: $26/mo (50K events, unlimited users)

Business: $80/mo (100K events, SSO, advanced features)

Overage: $0.00025/error event, $0.000025/transaction

Cost scales with error volume, not infrastructure size.

Datadog (Host-Based + Per-Feature)

Infrastructure: $15/host/mo

APM: $15/host/mo (additional)

Log Management: $0.10/GB ingested

RUM: $1.50/1,000 sessions

Cost scales with infrastructure size and data volume. Each feature is priced separately.

Cost Comparison at Different Scales

ScaleSentry (errors only)Datadog (APM)Both Together
Startup (3 hosts, 10K errors/mo)$26/mo$90/mo (APM+Infra)$116/mo
Growth (15 hosts, 50K errors/mo)$26/mo$450/mo$476/mo
Scale (50 hosts, 200K errors/mo)$105/mo$1,500/mo$1,605/mo
Enterprise (200 hosts, 1M errors/mo)$305/mo$6,000/mo$6,305/mo

Feature Comparison

Error tracking depth

Sentry

Sentry

Purpose-built. Best-in-class stack traces with source map support, breadcrumbs showing user actions before the error, issue grouping that intelligently merges duplicate errors, and release tracking that shows which deploy introduced a regression.

Datadog

Part of APM suite. Error tracking is functional but secondary to tracing. Stack traces are available but source map support is less robust. Issue grouping is less sophisticated.

Infrastructure monitoring

Datadog

Sentry

No infrastructure monitoring. Sentry tracks application errors and performance but does not monitor server CPU, memory, disk, or network metrics.

Datadog

Comprehensive infrastructure monitoring: host metrics, container monitoring (Docker, Kubernetes), cloud resource tracking (AWS, GCP, Azure), and custom metrics. The core of Datadog's platform.

Performance monitoring

Datadog

Sentry

Transaction-level performance monitoring with distributed tracing. Tracks request timing, database queries, and API call latency. Good for identifying slow endpoints and p95 latency issues.

Datadog

Full APM with distributed tracing, service maps, runtime metrics, continuous profiling, and database query analysis. More comprehensive than Sentry's performance monitoring.

Developer workflow

Sentry

Sentry

Deep integration with development tools: GitHub/GitLab commit linking, Jira/Linear issue creation from errors, Slack notifications, release management, and code owners (route errors to the team that wrote the code).

Datadog

Integration with CI/CD pipelines for deployment tracking. Slack and PagerDuty notifications. Less focused on the developer-specific workflow of fixing bugs.

The Verdict

These are complementary tools, not replacements. The sweet spot for most teams: Sentry for error tracking ($26/mo) plus Datadog for infrastructure ($15/host/mo). This is cheaper than using Datadog alone for both error tracking and APM.

Use Sentry for:

  • + Error tracking and crash reporting
  • + Source map support and stack trace quality
  • + Release tracking and regression detection
  • + Developer workflow (Jira, GitHub, code owners)

Use Datadog for:

  • + Infrastructure monitoring (hosts, containers, cloud)
  • + Full APM with service maps and profiling
  • + Log management and correlation
  • + System-wide observability dashboards

Frequently Asked Questions

Should I use Sentry and Datadog together?
Yes, many engineering teams do. The combination works well: Sentry for error tracking ($26/mo for 50K events) and Datadog for infrastructure monitoring ($15/host/mo + APM). Sentry provides better stack traces, issue grouping, and developer workflow integration for errors. Datadog provides better infrastructure metrics, log correlation, and system-wide observability. Using both is often cheaper than using Datadog alone for error tracking plus APM.
Does Datadog have error tracking?
Yes. Datadog's APM includes error tracking as part of its traces. Datadog Error Tracking groups errors, shows stack traces, and integrates with their alerting system. However, Sentry's error tracking is purpose-built and deeper: better source map support, better issue grouping algorithms, breadcrumbs for context, and tighter integration with development workflows (Jira, GitHub issues, release tracking).
How do the pricing models compare at scale?
At scale, the models diverge significantly. Sentry charges by event volume: 500K errors/month on Team costs approximately $138/month regardless of infrastructure size. Datadog charges by host: 50 hosts at $15/host/mo costs $750/month for APM alone, regardless of error volume. If you have many hosts but few errors, Datadog is more expensive. If you have few hosts but many errors, Sentry is more expensive. Most teams fall into the first category.
Which integrates better with CI/CD pipelines?
Sentry has a slight edge for development workflow integration. Sentry automatically links errors to commits and releases, shows which deploy introduced a regression, integrates with Jira and GitHub for issue tracking, and supports source map uploads as part of the build process. Datadog integrates well with CI/CD for deployment tracking but focuses more on operational metrics than developer workflow.
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