Papertrail

Simple hosted log aggregation with live tail and search, part of SolarWinds.

Verified facts: 3 of 3
Alternatives ranked: 5
Approved reviews: 0
Visits sent from here: 0

About Papertrail

Papertrail is a hosted log management service that has been around since 2011 and is now owned by SolarWinds. You send logs from servers, apps and platforms via syslog, a small agent or platform integrations, then watch them stream in a live tail view, search across systems, and turn saved searches into alerts sent to email, Slack, PagerDuty or webhooks. Older logs can be archived to Amazon S3. Its appeal has always been simplicity: setup takes minutes and the interface is a fast, readable log viewer rather than a sprawling analytics suite, which makes it popular with small teams and Heroku-style apps. The flip side is limited analytics, dashboards and correlation with metrics or traces, so larger teams often outgrow it. Pricing is usage-based by GB of logs per month with search retention tiers, and there is a free trial. It is a hosted web service.

Best for: Small teams that want quick, no-fuss log search and live tail.

What works

Very quick to set up with syslog
Fast, readable live tail and search
Saved searches become alerts easily

Why people leave

Limited dashboards and analytics
No metrics or tracing correlation on its own
Short search retention on lower tiers

Top Papertrail alternatives

See all 5

1
Better Stack
Modern log search plus uptime checks and on-call in one tool.
66.5
2
Loggly
Sister SolarWinds product with more dashboards and analytics.
62.6
3
Axiom
Keeps far more log data cheaply with a free plan.
59.6
4
Graylog
Self-hosted log management with a free open edition.
57.2
5
Datadog
Logs connected to metrics and traces for deeper investigations.
55.3

Why people left Papertrail

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Papertrail: common questions

Is Papertrail free?

No, Papertrail is a paid product. Starting price: From $5 per GB/month (checked on Papertrail's own site).

Is Papertrail open source?

No, Papertrail is not open source.

What platforms does Papertrail run on?

Papertrail is available for Web.

What are the best alternatives to Papertrail?

The highest-ranked Papertrail alternatives right now are Better Stack, Loggly and Axiom. See the full ranked list for pricing, platforms and verified facts.

See all 5 Papertrail alternatives

Papertrail facts

3 of 3 verified

Starting price: From $5 per GB/month; Checked Oct 25, 2026papertrail.com(opens source in a new tab); “Log Observability Starts at: $5.00 Per GB per month”
Founded: 2011; Checked Oct 25, 2026papertrail.com(opens source in a new tab); “Start Logging Web Developer’s Source of Truth Since 2011”
Search to alert: Saved searches become live alerts; Checked Oct 25, 2026papertrail.com(opens source in a new tab); “Catch errors early: Transition a saved search into a live alert to spot silent errors before they become customer-facing issues.”