Observability Basics

8 examples to get you started with Observability for Node.js backends - 6 basic and 2 intermediate.

Prerequisites

npm install @opentelemetry/api @opentelemetry/sdk-node @opentelemetry/auto-instrumentations-node

Pin Node 24.18.0 and load the OTel SDK before other imports in production entrypoints.

Basic Examples

1. Three Pillars in One Request

Logs, metrics, and traces describe the same incident from different angles.

// Log (Pino)
logger.info({ requestId, statusCode: 200, durationMs: 45 }, "request_complete");
 
// Metric (counter)
requestCounter.add(1, { method: "GET", route: "/users", status: "200" });
 
// Trace (span attribute)
span.setAttribute("http.status_code", 200);

Logs: discrete events with context - great for debugging one failure.
Metrics: aggregates over time - great for SLOs and alerts.
Traces: latency breakdown across services - great for slow requests.

Related: Metrics that Matter - RED method

2. Health vs Readiness Endpoints

Liveness and readiness serve different orchestrator probes.

app.get("/health", (_req, res) => res.json({ ok: true }));
 
app.get("/ready", async (_req, res) => {
  const dbOk = await db.ping();
  res.status(dbOk ? 200 : 503).json({ ready: dbOk });
});

/health - process up (liveness). No dependency checks.
/ready - can serve traffic (readiness). Fails when DB down.
Do not log readiness failures at error on every kube probe - sample or use metrics.

Related: Resilience Basics - fail fast on boot

3. RED Metrics Sketch

Rate, Errors, Duration - minimum HTTP service metrics.

import { metrics } from "@opentelemetry/api";
 
const meter = metrics.getMeter("orders-api");
const requestDuration = meter.createHistogram("http.server.duration", { unit: "ms" });
const requestCount = meter.createCounter("http.server.requests");
 
function recordRequest(method: string, route: string, status: number, ms: number) {
  requestCount.add(1, { method, route, status: String(status) });
  requestDuration.record(ms, { method, route, status: String(status) });
}

Rate - http.server.requests counter.
Errors - same counter filtered by status=5xx.
Duration - histogram for p50/p95/p99 in Prometheus or Datadog.

Related: SLOs & Error Budgets - SLO from histograms

4. Structured Log with trace_id

Correlate logs to traces in APM UIs.

import { trace } from "@opentelemetry/api";
 
const span = trace.getActiveSpan();
const traceId = span?.spanContext().traceId;
 
logger.info({ trace_id: traceId, event: "payment_captured" }, "payment ok");

Many APM tools link log lines to trace waterfall by trace_id.
Use consistent field name (trace_id) across services.
Pino mixin can inject trace_id automatically.

Related: Request Correlation IDs - requestId vs trace_id

5. Counter for Business Events

Metrics are not only HTTP - track domain events.

const ordersCreated = meter.createCounter("orders.created");
ordersCreated.add(1, { plan: "pro", region: "eu" });

Business counters power product dashboards, not just ops.
Low cardinality labels only - not userId on every metric.
Pair with logs for individual order debugging.

Related: Logging Basics - event field naming

6. Span for Manual Instrumentation

Auto-instrumentation misses your business logic boundaries.

import { trace } from "@opentelemetry/api";
 
const tracer = trace.getTracer("billing");
 
async function capturePayment(orderId: string) {
  return tracer.startActiveSpan("capturePayment", async (span) => {
    span.setAttribute("order.id", orderId);
    try {
      return await stripeCapture(orderId);
    } catch (err) {
      span.recordException(err as Error);
      span.setStatus({ code: 2 });
      throw err;
    } finally {
      span.end();
    }
  });
}

Name spans after operations (capturePayment), not function internals.
recordException attaches error to trace for APM error tracking.
End spans in finally - avoid leaked spans on early return.

Related: OpenTelemetry Node SDK - SDK setup

Intermediate Examples

7. Minimal OTel SDK Bootstrap

Load instrumentation before Express/Fastify imports.

// src/instrumentation.ts - import first in main.ts
import { NodeSDK } from "@opentelemetry/sdk-node";
import { getNodeAutoInstrumentations } from "@opentelemetry/auto-instrumentations-node";
import { OTLPTraceExporter } from "@opentelemetry/exporter-trace-otlp-http";
 
const sdk = new NodeSDK({
  traceExporter: new OTLPTraceExporter({
    url: process.env.OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT ?? "http://localhost:4318/v1/traces",
  }),
  instrumentations: [getNodeAutoInstrumentations()],
});
 
sdk.start();

instrumentation.ts must load before import express in entry file.
OTLP HTTP exporter sends to collector sidecar (4318) or SaaS agent.
Auto-instrumentation covers HTTP, fetch, and common DB drivers.

Related: OpenTelemetry Node SDK - full configuration

8. Alert on Symptoms, Not Logs

Page on SLO burn, not every stack trace.

# Pseudo-alert rule
alert: HighErrorRate
expr: rate(http_server_requests{status=~"5.."}[5m]) / rate(http_server_requests[5m]) > 0.05
for: 10m

Symptom: elevated 5xx rate over 5 minutes.
Not: single ERROR log line from one pod restart.
Tie alerts to SLOs & Error Budgets.

Related: Observability Best Practices - alerting rules

Node.js Learn Guides - Official learning path.
Node.js Best Practices (GitHub) - Curated production best practices.
NodeSource Blog & Resources - Enterprise Node.js performance and security content.
Distributed Systems with Node.js - Enterprise-ready distributed systems.
Node.js the Right Way - Server-side JavaScript fundamentals.

Stack versions: This page was written for Node.js 24.18.0 (Active LTS), npm 10+, TypeScript 5.6+, Express 5, Fastify 5, and NestJS 11.

Prerequisites

npm install @opentelemetry/api @opentelemetry/sdk-node @opentelemetry/auto-instrumentations-node

Pin Node 24.18.0 and load the OTel SDK before other imports in production entrypoints.

Basic Examples

1. Three Pillars in One Request

Logs, metrics, and traces describe the same incident from different angles.

// Log (Pino)
logger.info({ requestId, statusCode: 200, durationMs: 45 }, "request_complete");
 
// Metric (counter)
requestCounter.add(1, { method: "GET", route: "/users", status: "200" });
 
// Trace (span attribute)
span.setAttribute("http.status_code", 200);

Logs: discrete events with context - great for debugging one failure.
Metrics: aggregates over time - great for SLOs and alerts.
Traces: latency breakdown across services - great for slow requests.

Related: Metrics that Matter - RED method

2. Health vs Readiness Endpoints

Liveness and readiness serve different orchestrator probes.

app.get("/health", (_req, res) => res.json({ ok: true }));
 
app.get("/ready", async (_req, res) => {
  const dbOk = await db.ping();
  res.status(dbOk ? 200 : 503).json({ ready: dbOk });
});

/health - process up (liveness). No dependency checks.
/ready - can serve traffic (readiness). Fails when DB down.
Do not log readiness failures at error on every kube probe - sample or use metrics.

Related: Resilience Basics - fail fast on boot

3. RED Metrics Sketch

Rate, Errors, Duration - minimum HTTP service metrics.

import { metrics } from "@opentelemetry/api";
 
const meter = metrics.getMeter("orders-api");
const requestDuration = meter.createHistogram("http.server.duration", { unit: "ms" });
const requestCount = meter.createCounter("http.server.requests");
 
function recordRequest(method: string, route: string, status: number, ms: number) {
  requestCount.add(1, { method, route, status: String(status) });
  requestDuration.record(ms, { method, route, status: String(status) });
}

Rate - http.server.requests counter.
Errors - same counter filtered by status=5xx.
Duration - histogram for p50/p95/p99 in Prometheus or Datadog.

Related: SLOs & Error Budgets - SLO from histograms

4. Structured Log with trace_id

Correlate logs to traces in APM UIs.

import { trace } from "@opentelemetry/api";
 
const span = trace.getActiveSpan();
const traceId = span?.spanContext().traceId;
 
logger.info({ trace_id: traceId, event: "payment_captured" }, "payment ok");

Many APM tools link log lines to trace waterfall by trace_id.
Use consistent field name (trace_id) across services.
Pino mixin can inject trace_id automatically.

Related: Request Correlation IDs - requestId vs trace_id

5. Counter for Business Events

Metrics are not only HTTP - track domain events.

const ordersCreated = meter.createCounter("orders.created");
ordersCreated.add(1, { plan: "pro", region: "eu" });

Business counters power product dashboards, not just ops.
Low cardinality labels only - not userId on every metric.
Pair with logs for individual order debugging.

Related: Logging Basics - event field naming

6. Span for Manual Instrumentation

Auto-instrumentation misses your business logic boundaries.

import { trace } from "@opentelemetry/api";
 
const tracer = trace.getTracer("billing");
 
async function capturePayment(orderId: string) {
  return tracer.startActiveSpan("capturePayment", async (span) => {
    span.setAttribute("order.id", orderId);
    try {
      return await stripeCapture(orderId);
    } catch (err) {
      span.recordException(err as Error);
      span.setStatus({ code: 2 });
      throw err;
    } finally {
      span.end();
    }
  });
}

Name spans after operations (capturePayment), not function internals.
recordException attaches error to trace for APM error tracking.
End spans in finally - avoid leaked spans on early return.

Related: OpenTelemetry Node SDK - SDK setup

Intermediate Examples

7. Minimal OTel SDK Bootstrap

Load instrumentation before Express/Fastify imports.

// src/instrumentation.ts - import first in main.ts
import { NodeSDK } from "@opentelemetry/sdk-node";
import { getNodeAutoInstrumentations } from "@opentelemetry/auto-instrumentations-node";
import { OTLPTraceExporter } from "@opentelemetry/exporter-trace-otlp-http";
 
const sdk = new NodeSDK({
  traceExporter: new OTLPTraceExporter({
    url: process.env.OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT ?? "http://localhost:4318/v1/traces",
  }),
  instrumentations: [getNodeAutoInstrumentations()],
});
 
sdk.start();

instrumentation.ts must load before import express in entry file.
OTLP HTTP exporter sends to collector sidecar (4318) or SaaS agent.
Auto-instrumentation covers HTTP, fetch, and common DB drivers.

Related: OpenTelemetry Node SDK - full configuration

8. Alert on Symptoms, Not Logs

Page on SLO burn, not every stack trace.

# Pseudo-alert rule
alert: HighErrorRate
expr: rate(http_server_requests{status=~"5.."}[5m]) / rate(http_server_requests[5m]) > 0.05
for: 10m

Symptom: elevated 5xx rate over 5 minutes.
Not: single ERROR log line from one pod restart.
Tie alerts to SLOs & Error Budgets.

Related: Observability Best Practices - alerting rules

Node.js Learn Guides - Official learning path.
Node.js Best Practices (GitHub) - Curated production best practices.
NodeSource Blog & Resources - Enterprise Node.js performance and security content.
Distributed Systems with Node.js - Enterprise-ready distributed systems.
Node.js the Right Way - Server-side JavaScript fundamentals.

Stack versions: This page was written for Node.js 24.18.0 (Active LTS), npm 10+, TypeScript 5.6+, Express 5, Fastify 5, and NestJS 11.

Observability Basics

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Observability Basics