{"data":{"slug":"parca","name":"Parca","tagline":"Apache-2.0 eBPF continuous profiling down to the line number","category":"observability","categoryName":"Observability","url":"https://parca.dev","github":"https://github.com/parca-dev/parca","pricing":"open-source","hook":"Parca is an open-source continuous profiler: its eBPF agent profiles every process on a host with very low overhead, and the server stores pprof profiles so you can see CPU and memory use over time, down to the line number.","whatsGood":"Apache-2.0 (parca-dev/parca), release v0.29.1 (2026-09-28). The agent discovers targets from Kubernetes or systemd and supports C, C++, Rust, Go and more without instrumentation. Everything is pprof, so it ingests profiles from any language and interoperates with existing tools. Label-based search lets you compare profiles across any dimension. ★~5k.","theCatch":"Still 0.x. The eBPF agent needs root and a recent kernel. Interpreted languages get less detail than compiled ones. It overlaps with Grafana Pyroscope, which integrates more tightly if you are already on Grafana. Polar Signals runs the commercial cloud.","verdict":"Zero-instrumentation profiling that cuts real infra cost — a strong pick outside the Grafana stack.","addedAt":"2026-10-18","featured":false,"domain":"Observability","subSpecialty":"Observability","subcategory":"Observability","tags":["self-host","permissive","observability","active"],"capabilities":[],"surfaces":["Self-host"],"ecosystem":["Multi-platform"],"licenseModel":"Apache-2.0","githubStars":4995,"starsPerWeek":12,"access":"free","archived":false,"repo":{"createdAt":"2018-11-27","pushedAt":"2026-09-29","license":"Apache-2.0","archived":false,"checkedAt":"2026-10-19"}},"related":[{"slug":"sentry","name":"Sentry","tagline":"Error tracking that actually helps"},{"slug":"grafana","name":"Grafana","tagline":"Dashboards for everything observable"},{"slug":"prometheus","name":"Prometheus","tagline":"Time-series metrics for cloud-native"},{"slug":"opentelemetry","name":"OpenTelemetry","tagline":"Vendor-neutral observability framework"},{"slug":"datadog","name":"Datadog","tagline":"Unified observability platform"}],"links":{"self":"/api/gems/parca","html":"/gems/parca","markdown":"/gems/parca.md","category":"/api/gems?category=observability","categoryPage":"/stacks/observability"}}