Helicone: Open Source Alternative to LangSmith

Helicone is an LLM observability and AI gateway platform with 5.8k+ GitHub stars — a LangSmith alternative acquired by Mintlify in March 2026. One-line integration for logging, cost tracking, and prompt management.

Compare Helicone with Weights & Biases and Datadog before you choose your stack.

Key features

Observability & logging

• One-line integration with OpenAI, Anthropic, Cohere, and more
• Request/response logging with full prompt capture
• Cost tracking per request, model, and user
• Latency monitoring and performance analytics
• Custom properties and user tracking

AI gateway

• Proxy-based architecture — zero code changes required
• Rate limiting and usage quotas
• Load balancing across API keys and providers
• Caching for repeated prompts
• Fallback chains for reliability

Prompt management

• Version control for prompts
• A/B testing and experiments
• Prompt playground for debugging
• Template management and sharing

Analytics & insights

• Real-time dashboards and alerts
• User-level usage analytics
• Model comparison and benchmarking
• Error tracking and debugging
• Export to Datadog, BigQuery, and S3

Helicone vs LangSmith

	Helicone	LangSmith
License	Apache-2.0 (open source)	Proprietary
Data residency	Self-hosted option	Vendor cloud
Privacy	No third-party tracking by default	Vendor analytics pipeline
Customization	SQL and plugin extensibility	Limited to product UI
Cost	Free tier + self-hosting	Usage-based SaaS

Choose Helicone if you want open-source code, self-hosting options, and full control over your data and deployment.

Choose LangSmith if you prefer a managed proprietary product with vendor support and minimal setup.

Browse more open-source alternatives to LangSmith, or explore other tools in Analytics.

At a glance

License	Apache-2.0
Stack	TypeScript, Python, PostgreSQL
Self-hosted	Yes — Helicone OSS
Cloud	helicone.ai (managed)
Integration	Proxy-based, one-line

Self-hosting

git clone https://github.com/Helicone/helicone.git
cd helicone && docker compose up

Helicone can be self-hosted with Docker. The managed cloud provides automatic updates and scaling.

FAQ

Is Helicone a free alternative to LangSmith?

Yes. Helicone is open source under Apache-2.0. You can self-host it at no software cost — you only pay for infrastructure or optional managed services.

How does Helicone compare to LangSmith?

Helicone gives you source code access, self-hosting, and data ownership. LangSmith is a proprietary product focused on managed convenience. See the comparison table above for a side-by-side breakdown.

Can I self-host Helicone?

Yes. Helicone supports self-hosted deployment, which is a core reason teams choose it over LangSmith. Check the Getting started or Self-hosting section for install commands.

Is Helicone suitable for production?

Helicone is actively maintained with a strong open-source community. Many teams run it in production as a Analytics alternative to LangSmith. Review the At a glance table for license and stack details.

What are alternatives to Helicone and LangSmith?

Browse alternatives to LangSmith for more open-source options, including tools compared to Weights & Biases. Explore the full Analytics category for related projects.