Datadog and Dynatrace both offer full stack observability, but they charge in very different ways. Datadog sells each product separately, mostly per host per month, and has a free tier for up to 5 hosts. Dynatrace asks for one annual commitment at platform level and draws everything down from it at published rate card prices, with a 15 day free trial. As a rough guide, Datadog suits teams that want to start small and add products, and Dynatrace suits larger organisations that want one commitment and heavy automation.
These two names often come up together on enterprise monitoring shortlists. If you're a scaling SaaS business or an agency running infrastructure for clients, the pricing model matters as much as the features, because it decides how predictable your bill will be.
Datadog vs Dynatrace at a glance
| Datadog | Dynatrace | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Per product, mostly per host per month | One annual platform commitment, drawn down at rate card prices |
| Free option | Free infrastructure tier, up to 5 hosts | 15 day free trial |
| Entry infrastructure price | Pro, $15 per host per month billed annually | Foundation and Discovery, $7 per host per month |
| Full stack or APM | APM from $31 per host per month billed annually, with Infrastructure attached | Full-Stack Monitoring, $58 per month per 8 GiB host |
| Metric retention | 15 months on Pro | 15 months at 1 minute granularity included |
| Trace retention | Indexed spans with paid retention options | 10 days included, extendable to 10 years |
All prices are from each vendor's own pricing page, as of October 2026, in US dollars.
How Datadog charges
Datadog lists each product with its own price. For infrastructure monitoring there's a Free tier for up to 5 hosts with 1 day metric retention, Pro at $15 per host per month billed annually or $18 on demand, and Enterprise at $23 per host per month billed annually or $27 on demand. Pro includes 15 month metric retention and 1,000+ integrations.
Application performance monitoring is separate. Datadog's APM starts at $31 per host per month billed annually with Infrastructure Monitoring attached, and its FAQ says APM can be bought standalone at $36 per host per month billed annually. One useful detail: Datadog says a billable APM host is one actively sending traces, so databases, caches and load balancers that aren't instrumented don't count as APM hosts.
How Dynatrace charges
Dynatrace describes its model as one commitment with total flexibility. You make an annual commitment at platform level, not per capability or per month, and everything you use draws down from it at its rate card prices. It says there are no overage premiums, and it includes real time visibility, forecasting and alerts on sudden usage changes.
| Dynatrace option | Rate card price | How it's billed |
|---|---|---|
| Foundation and Discovery | $7 per month per host | $0.01 per hour per host |
| Infrastructure Monitoring | $29 per month per host | $0.04 per hour per host |
| Full-Stack Monitoring | $58 per month per 8 GiB host | $0.01 per memory GiB hour |
Notice the Full-Stack unit: it's priced by host memory, not just by host count, so a large server costs more than a small one. Full-Stack includes APM, automated root cause analysis, code level profiling, Kubernetes platform monitoring and OpenTelemetry metrics and traces.
Logs on Dynatrace
Logs are often where observability bills grow fastest, so it's worth knowing how Dynatrace handles them. Its Log Analytics offers two models you can mix across your environment. Pay per Query charges $0.20 per GiB to ingest and process, $0.0007 per GiB per day to retain and $0.0035 per GiB scanned when you query. Bundled Queries charges the same to ingest, then $0.02 per GiB per day with queries included, for a minimum of 10 and up to 35 days of retention. Retention can run from 1 day to 10 years.
Datadog prices logs as a separate product too, by data ingested and indexed, so ask both vendors to price your real daily log volume before you compare headline host prices.
Where each one stands out
Datadog
- A free starting point for up to 5 hosts, so small teams can try it without a contract
- Buy only the products you use and add more later
- 1,000+ integrations and out of the box dashboards
- Clear per host pricing for each product
Dynatrace
- One commitment covering every capability from day one
- Automated root cause analysis built into Full-Stack Monitoring
- Long retention options, with traces extendable to 10 years
- AI features for investigations, forecasting and anomaly detection across the platform
New to the term observability? Read our guide to observability versus monitoring.
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Questions to ask before you choose
- Do you want to start free and grow, or commit for a year? Datadog's free tier suits the first, Dynatrace's annual model the second.
- How big are your hosts? Dynatrace Full-Stack is priced per 8 GiB of memory, so map your servers before comparing.
- Which products will you need in year one? Add up Datadog's per product prices rather than looking only at infrastructure.
- Who will run it? Both are hosted, but automated root cause analysis may save a small team more time.
If neither fits, I've compared the best observability tools more widely, and there's a list of alternatives to Datadog. For application performance specifically, see the best APM tools.
My verdict
For a small or mid sized team that wants to start free and add products as it grows, Datadog is the easier entry point. For a larger organisation that wants every capability available under one annual commitment, with strong automated root cause analysis, Dynatrace is built for that. Price your real hosts and products on both pages before you decide, because the cheaper option depends entirely on your setup.
A different comparison is in our Datadog versus Grafana comparison.
Frequently asked questions
Is Dynatrace more expensive than Datadog?
It depends on your setup. Dynatrace Full-Stack is $58 per month per 8 GiB host, and Datadog APM starts at $31 per host per month billed annually plus Infrastructure, as of October 2026.
Does Dynatrace have a free trial?
Yes. Dynatrace offers a 15 day free trial.
Does Datadog have a free plan?
Yes. Datadog's free infrastructure tier covers up to 5 hosts with 1 day metric retention.
How does Dynatrace pricing work?
Dynatrace asks for an annual commitment at platform level, and usage draws down from it at its published rate card prices.
What counts as an APM host in Datadog?
Datadog says a billable APM host is one actively generating traces sent to Datadog. Uninstrumented databases, caches and load balancers don't count.
