Observability Overview

Comprehensive observability with logs, metrics, access logs, and distributed tracing for monitoring Traefik’s performance and traffic.

Observability Overview

Traefik provides complete observability through logs, access logs, metrics, and distributed tracing. These features give you deep visibility into your infrastructure’s performance and traffic patterns.

Key Observability Features

Traefik’s observability features include:

• Logs - System events, configuration changes, and operational information
• Access Logs - Detailed request/response information for traffic analysis
• Metrics - Performance metrics in multiple formats (Prometheus, Datadog, StatsD, InfluxDB, OpenTelemetry)
• Tracing - Distributed tracing for request flow visualization

Quick Start

Enable all observability features globally:

YAML

accessLog: {}

metrics:
  prometheus: {}

tracing:
  otlp: {}

log:
  level: INFO

Per-EntryPoint Configuration

You can disable observability features for specific entrypoints:

YAML

entryPoints:
  web:
    address: ':80'
  metrics:
    address: ':8082'
    observability:
      accessLogs: false
      tracing: false
      metrics: false

Router-level observability configuration overrides global defaults.

Observability Components

Logs

Traefik logs capture everything that happens within Traefik itself:

• Startup and shutdown events
• Configuration reloads
• Error conditions
• System warnings

Learn more about Logs →

Access Logs

Access logs provide detailed information about each request:

• Source IP addresses
• Request methods and paths
• Response status codes
• Request/response sizes
• Processing duration
• Router and service information

Learn more about Access Logs →

Metrics

Traefik exposes metrics for monitoring performance:

• Request counts and rates
• Response times and latencies
• HTTP status code distribution
• Active connections
• TLS certificate expiration

Supported backends:

• Prometheus - Pull-based metrics scraping
• Datadog - Push to Datadog Agent
• StatsD - StatsD protocol support
• InfluxDB 2.x - Time-series database
• OpenTelemetry - OTLP protocol

Learn more about Metrics →

Distributed Tracing

Tracing provides end-to-end visibility into request flows:

• Request propagation across services
• Latency analysis
• Service dependencies
• Error tracking

Traefik uses OpenTelemetry for distributed tracing, compatible with:

• Jaeger
• Zipkin
• Any OpenTelemetry-compatible backend

Learn more about Tracing →

Common Configuration Options

Add Internals

Enable observability for internal services like ping@internal:

YAML

accessLog:
  addInternals: true

metrics:
  addInternals: true

tracing:
  addInternals: true

Official Grafana Dashboards

Traefik provides official Grafana dashboards:

• On-Premises Dashboard
• Kubernetes Dashboard

Best Practices

Performance Considerations

• Enable router-level metrics only when needed (high cardinality)
• Use access log filtering to reduce volume
• Configure appropriate trace sampling rates
• Use buffering for high-traffic scenarios

Security

• Redact sensitive headers in access logs
• Secure metrics endpoints with authentication
• Use TLS for collector connections
• Avoid logging credentials or tokens

Next Steps

Configure Logs

Set up Traefik system logs with rotation and formatting

Enable Access Logs

Track every request with detailed access logging

Setup Metrics

Export metrics to Prometheus, Datadog, and more

Configure Tracing

Implement distributed tracing with OpenTelemetry