Updated 30 March 2026

Sentry vs New Relic

Point solution versus platform. Sentry is the best-in-class error tracking tool. New Relic is a comprehensive observability platform with a notably generous free tier. For teams under 100GB of data per month, the combination of Sentry Free and New Relic Free creates a zero-cost monitoring stack.

Pricing Models

Sentry (Event-Based)

Developer: Free (5K events, 1 user)

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

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

Cost scales with error volume. Focused on error tracking only.

New Relic (Data-Based)

Free: 100GB/mo data, 1 full user

Standard: $0.30/GB beyond 100GB, per-user pricing

Pro: $0.50/GB, advanced features

Cost scales with data ingestion. Full platform (APM, infra, logs, errors).

The Zero-Cost Monitoring Stack

For startups and personal projects, combining Sentry Free and New Relic Free provides comprehensive monitoring at $0/month.

Sentry Developer (Free)

  • 5,000 error events/month
  • 1 user
  • Best-in-class stack traces
  • Source map support
  • Release tracking
  • All SDK support

New Relic Free

  • 100GB data ingestion/month
  • 1 full-platform user
  • APM (application performance)
  • Infrastructure monitoring
  • Log management
  • Browser and mobile monitoring

Limitation: 1 user on each platform. For teams of 2+, at least one tool will need a paid plan.

Feature Comparison

Error tracking

Sentry

Sentry

Purpose-built and best-in-class. Superior source map support, intelligent issue grouping, breadcrumbs for context, release regression tracking, and direct integration with Jira/GitHub for issue management. The error tracking experience is significantly deeper than any platform tool.

New Relic

Errors Inbox provides error grouping, stack traces, and basic triage. Functional for identifying and tracking errors but lacks Sentry's depth in source map support, breadcrumb context, and developer workflow integration.

APM / Performance

New Relic

Sentry

Transaction-level performance monitoring. Tracks request timing, database queries, and API calls. Identifies slow endpoints and p95/p99 latency. Good but not as comprehensive as a dedicated APM platform.

New Relic

Full APM with distributed tracing, service maps, database query analysis, and external service monitoring. New Relic APM has been a market leader for over a decade. Significantly more comprehensive than Sentry's performance features.

Infrastructure monitoring

New Relic

Sentry

None. Sentry does not monitor servers, containers, or cloud resources.

New Relic

Comprehensive infrastructure monitoring: host metrics, container and Kubernetes monitoring, cloud integrations (AWS, GCP, Azure), and custom metrics. Included in the free tier.

Log management

New Relic

Sentry

None. Sentry captures breadcrumbs (a log-like trail of events before an error) but does not provide log storage, search, or analysis.

New Relic

Full log management with ingestion, search, parsing, alerting, and correlation with APM data. Included in the data quota (100GB free). Powerful for debugging issues that require log context.

Pricing predictability

Tie (both have spike risks)

Sentry

Event-based pricing is predictable if your error volume is stable. A sudden bug spike can cause unexpected overages. Spending caps and rate limiting help control costs.

New Relic

Data-based pricing can be unpredictable. A verbose logging configuration or a sudden spike in telemetry data can push you past the 100GB free tier quickly. Monitoring data ingestion requires vigilance.

The Verdict

Choose Sentry if:

  • + Error tracking quality is your top priority
  • + You need source map support for frontend apps
  • + Developer workflow integration (Jira, GitHub) matters
  • + You already have infrastructure monitoring elsewhere

Choose New Relic if:

  • + You want everything in one platform
  • + The 100GB free tier covers your data needs
  • + APM and infrastructure monitoring are priorities
  • + You want to minimize the number of monitoring tools

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I use Sentry Free and New Relic Free together?
Yes, and it is a powerful zero-cost monitoring stack for startups. Sentry Developer (free, 5K error events/month) handles error tracking with better stack traces and developer workflow integration. New Relic Free (100GB data/month, 1 full user) handles APM, infrastructure monitoring, and log management. Together, you get comprehensive monitoring at $0/month. The only limitation is 1 user on each platform.
How generous is New Relic's free tier really?
Very generous. 100GB of data ingestion per month covers most startups and small applications. It includes APM, infrastructure monitoring, browser monitoring, logs, and error tracking. The 1 full-platform user limitation means only 1 person gets full dashboard access (additional basic users can view dashboards but not configure alerts or queries). For a solo developer or a startup with one DevOps person, this is sufficient.
Which has better error tracking?
Sentry. Error tracking is Sentry's primary product and it shows: better source map support for frontend applications, more intelligent issue grouping that merges related errors, breadcrumbs that show user actions before the error, release tracking that identifies which deploy introduced a bug, and tighter integration with developer tools (Jira, GitHub, Linear). New Relic's Errors Inbox is functional but less specialized.
Which is better for full-stack monitoring?
New Relic. As a platform, New Relic covers APM, infrastructure, logs, browser monitoring, mobile monitoring, synthetics, and error tracking in one product. Sentry only covers error tracking and basic performance monitoring. For teams wanting everything in one place, New Relic's platform approach reduces tool sprawl and provides correlated data across the entire stack.
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