ELK Stack vs SparkLogs
ELK Stack
elastic.coSparkLogs
sparklogs.comSide by side
| Figure | ELK Stack | SparkLogs |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | $100/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | — |
| Free trial | Yes | Yes |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| iOS | — | Yes |
| Android | — | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 12 | 3 |
| Spec score · Log Management Software | 9.5 (#1) | 9.0 (#13) |
| Archive export | Yes | Yes |
| Deployment | Elastic Stack is available as hosted Elastic Cloud service or self-managed software for on-premises, public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid environments. | both |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Integrations | Elastic offers over 300 turn-key integrations for Search, Security, Observability, and cloud providers including AWS, Azure, and GCP. | Supported ingestion tooling includes OpenTelemetry, Grafana Alloy, Vector, Fluent Bit, filebeat, Logstash, Beats, and APIs for HTTPS JSON, Elasticsearch bulk, and Loki push. |
| Live log tailing | Yes | Yes |
| Log pipelines | Yes | Yes |
| Log retention | 30 | 365 |
| Security | Security capabilities include authentication integrations, role-based access control, SSL/TLS encryption, IP filtering, audit logging, and field- and document-level controls. | SparkLogs states that connections use TLS 1.2 or newer and data at rest uses AES-256 encryption. |
| Structured log parsing | Yes | Yes |
| Support | Elastic Cloud subscription tiers include varying levels of support, while paid self-managed Gold, Platinum, and Enterprise subscriptions include support. | SparkLogs invites questions, ideas, and feedback through its Discord community, and provides a security and compliance contact path. |
Plans
ELK Stack
- BasicPrice not published
- Logs EssentialsPriced on request
- Complete$0.09 a month
- Standard$99 a month
- Gold$114 a month
- Platinum$131 a month
- Enterprise$184 a month
- Basic (self-managed)Free
- Elastic Cloud hostedPriced on request
- Elastic Cloud ServerlessPriced on request
SparkLogs
- SparkLogs Cloud$100 a month
- Private Cloud$440 a month
- Self-Hosted Querying$2,000 a month
In their own words
ELK Stack
The Elastic Stack combines Elasticsearch, Kibana, Beats and Logstash to bring data from different sources into search, analysis and visualization workflows. Elasticsearch is a distributed, JSON-based search and analytics engine, while Kibana provides dashboards, visualizations, live presentations and deployment management. Elastic Agent, Beats and a web crawler can ingest information from applications, infrastructure and public content. Features include alerting, machine learning, vector search, graph analytics, clustering, high availability and data lifecycle management. Elastic positions the platform for Search, Observability and Security, including centralized logging, monitoring and security analytics. It is available as hosted Elastic Cloud or as self-managed software for on-premises, public cloud, private cloud and hybrid environments. Elasticsearch and Kibana have an open source foundation, and Elasticsearch can be downloaded and started free. Elastic Cloud offers a 14-day trial without a credit card. Hosted pricing depends on deployment components and can include snapshot storage and data transfer charges; listed hosted tiers start at $99 a month.
SparkLogs
SparkLogs is a cloud-first log management and observability platform for collecting, querying, and retaining telemetry. Its SQL-like, type-aware LQL offers interactive histograms and exploration across billions of events. Data can be sent through the SparkLogs Agent or authenticated Ingest Keys, with ingestion tooling that includes OpenTelemetry, Grafana Alloy, Vector, Fluent Bit, filebeat, Logstash, Beats, and APIs. AutoExtract identifies standard fields in raw messages, while AutoClassify groups similar messages into patterns. The platform also provides live log tailing, pipelines, archive export, and tools for AI-assisted fleet investigations using logs and system state. It supports cloud and self-hosted deployment and runs on web and native desktop and mobile apps. SparkLogs says connections use TLS 1.2 or newer and stored data uses AES-256; it is not yet SOC 2 or ISO 27001 certified. The official agent currently supports Windows 10 or later and Windows Server 2016 or later on x64. SparkLogs Cloud costs $100 a month, with 300 GB monthly ingestion included and a listed free allowance under 25 GB per month. Private Cloud is $440 a month; Self-Hosted Querying is $2,000 a month.