Deprecate Zipkin exporter by lmolkova · Pull Request #4715 · open-telemetry/opentelemetry-specification

lmolkova · 2025-10-29T23:13:17Z

This PR intends to gather feedback on Zipkin exporter usage and possible deprecation.

What inspired it:

The transformations documented in zipkin exporter are not followed in practice (e.g. otel-java or zipkin-otel). I don't see any signs of transformations in collector zipkinexporter
These transformations were not updated despite Semantic Conventions changes and it went unnoticed (e.g. database conventions went stable ~ 6 months ago, but the document still uses deprecated attributes).
Public download stats mostly show low usage. e.g.
- python:
  - opentelemetry-exporter-zipkin - ~155k downloads last month
  - opentelemetry-exporter-jaeger (deprecated and removed from the spec) - ~513k downloads last month
  - opentelemetry-exporter-otlp - 96M downloads last month
- .NET trends for Zipkin, Jaeger, OTLP exporters also show zipkin having slightly less downloads than deprecated Jaeger and ~10 times less than OTLP
- JS shows 2.5x difference in download numbers between
  - @opentelemetry/exporter-zipkin - ~20M last month - THIS IS QUITE HIGH (possible explanation in Deprecate Zipkin exporter #4715 (comment))
  - while @opentelemetry/exporter-trace-otlp-http along with @opentelemetry/exporter-trace-otlp-grpc have ~48M downloads
- I don't have access to Java maven download stats
Availability of experimental OTLP support in zipkin server and zipkin exporter in collector in beta status
Low activity on issues org:open-telemetry zipkin in:title - most of them are SIG work items including collector zipkin exporter with just a few issues created by end users.

linux-foundation-easycla · 2025-10-29T23:13:22Z

The committers listed above are authorized under a signed CLA.

✅ login: lmolkova / name: Liudmila Molkova (42ecde8)

jsuereth · 2025-10-30T14:04:58Z

I'm a fan of moving this direction.

Ideally, Zipkin would support OTLP based ingestion prior to deprecation (in non-beta module). However, given the existing breakage and lack of detection, I think it's good to pulse check actual usage.

We could deprecate the specification and allow OTEL based zipkin exporters to continue to exist and evolve per-use demand until Zipkin OTLP-based ingestion is "non-beta" (whatever release stage they use for this).

pichlermarc · 2025-11-03T09:56:07Z

JS shows 2.5x difference in download numbers between

@opentelemetry/exporter-zipkin - ~20M last month - THIS IS QUITE HIGH

while @opentelemetry/exporter-trace-otlp-http along with @opentelemetry/exporter-trace-otlp-grpc have ~48M downloads

The high download numbers of @opentelemetry/exporter-zipkin are likely due to its inclusion in @opentelemetry/sdk-node. It likely does not reflect actual usage numbers as it gets auto-downloaded, but then remains unused. The diff of @opentelemetry/sdk-node and @opentelemetry/exporter-zipkin is ~3.2M per month. We unfortunately have a lot of outdated examples that use Zipkin, so I have also seen that LLMs frequently spit out examples Zipkin exporter examples which may contribute to the high number.

I support deprecation given that the collector exporter exists as a workaround if needed.

We could deprecate the specification and allow OTEL based zipkin exporters to continue to exist and evolve per-use demand until Zipkin OTLP-based ingestion is "non-beta" (whatever release stage they use for this).

I think this is a good idea. If deprecated we'd likely keep the packages around anyway for a while as it requires almost no maintenance. We did the same with Jaeger.

trentm · 2025-11-04T15:46:10Z

We unfortunately have a lot of outdated examples that use Zipkin

As well, there is this section of the docs that mentions using the zipkin exporter: https://opentelemetry.io/docs/languages/js/exporters/#zipkin
We could perhaps remove that section.

pellared

Shouldn't we also deprecate this section: https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-specification/blob/main/specification/configuration/sdk-environment-variables.md#zipkin-exporter ?

cijothomas · 2025-11-04T18:21:41Z

Public download stats mostly show low usage. e.g.

For Rust:
OTLP Exporter has ~50M all-time download counts vs ~2M for Zipkin. Jaeger (deprecated) had ~13M downloads.

Re-itereating extremely low usage for Zipkin exporter from Rust too.

pellared

Nice! Just some nit comments.

anuraaga · 2025-11-13T01:24:13Z

/cc @reta as the current most active maintainer on zipkin and @making who pushed forward zipkin-otel, would be good to hear your thoughts on this. I tend to agree that if the exporters aren't converting correctly from newer versions of instrumentation and there aren't any reports on it, there's probably not high usage out there.

making · 2025-11-13T01:52:35Z

I tend to agree too. At least for Java, the zipkin exporter uses dreprecated attributes and lacks resource attributes. If users want to send trace signals to Zipkin, they should use the otlp collector from zipkin-otel.

reta · 2025-11-13T02:27:45Z

/cc @reta as the current most active maintainer on zipkin and @making who pushed forward zipkin-otel, would be good to hear your thoughts on this. I tend to agree that if the exporters aren't converting correctly from newer versions of instrumentation and there aren't any reports on it, there's probably not high usage out there.

Thanks a lot for heads up @anuraaga , I agree with @making (and you) on the otel part, with the resources we have at the moment, that would be a right move I believe. Thank you.

Co-authored-by: Robert Pająk <pellared@hotmail.com>

reyang · 2025-11-18T16:31:34Z

Consider the following clarifications:

The existing Zipkin exporters will be marked as deprecated immediately once this PR is merged, maintainers should not take any feature request for Zipkin exporters.
The existing Zipkin exporters will continue to receive security patches and critical bug fixes until the Dec. 1st, 2026 (adjust the date to meet the 1-year support policy).

pellared · 2025-11-18T17:11:33Z

The existing Zipkin exporters will continue to receive security patches and critical bug fixes until the Dec. 1st, 2026 (adjust the date to meet the 1-year support policy).

It would be good to create a blog post which announces it. Also it would be nice if each language additionally announce it in its changelog or/and release notes.

lmolkova · 2025-11-19T01:15:35Z

thanks @reyang !

The first point is up to maintainers - I believe one year count down starts from the moment they deprecate the artifact:

existing Zipkin exporters will be marked as deprecated immediately once this PR is merged, maintainers should not take any feature request for Zipkin exporters.

Updated text to

Zipkin exporter support will be removed from OpenTelemetry specification in December 2026.

Note: This document remains here for backwards compatibility and
will be removed in a future version. Existing stable Zipkin exporters MUST
continue to be supported for at least one year after the artifact is deprecated,
following the SDK stability guarantees.
Implementing a Zipkin exporter is not required for new SDKs.

I can draft a blog post as well.

### Context - Make the W3C randomness flag required. ([#4761](#4761)) ### Traces - Deprecate Zipkin exporter document and make exporter implementation optional. ([#4715](#4715)) - Add spec for `AlwaysRecord` sampler ([#4699](#4699)) ### Metrics - Stabilize `Enabled` API for synchronous instruments. ([#4746](#4746)) - Allow instrument `Enabled` implementation to have additional optimizations and features. ([#4747](#4747)) ### Logs - Stabilize `LogRecordProcessor.Enabled`. ([#4717](#4717)) ### SDK Configuration - Clarifies that guidance related to boolean environment variables is not applicable to other configuration interfaces. ([#4723](#4723)) --------- Co-authored-by: Armin Ruech <7052238+arminru@users.noreply.github.com>

## Summary Deprecate OpenTracing compatibility requirements in the specification as Stage 1 of issue #4849. This PR changes the OpenTracing compatibility spec document status to deprecated, adds a deprecation note, and updates wording to make it explicit that new OpenTracing compatibility implementations are no longer required by this specification. ## What changed - `specification/compatibility/opentracing.md` - Status changed from `Stable` to `Deprecated` - Added top-level deprecation note: - OpenTracing compatibility requirements are deprecated - existing shims MAY continue for backwards compatibility - new compatibility implementations are not required - removal criteria/timeline deferred to a separate discussion - Updated one normative paragraph to historical framing, aligned with deprecation - Added explicit sentence that this section remains for migration/backwards compatibility guidance - `CHANGELOG.md` - Added Unreleased/Compatibility entry for deprecating OpenTracing compatibility requirements ## Context and precedent - Addresses: #4849 - Follows the staged approach discussed in #4849 comments - Uses the same deprecation pattern/intent as prior deprecation work in #4715 (Zipkin exporter) ## Scope This PR is intentionally narrow (Stage 1 only): deprecate requirements in spec text. ### Non-goals - No immediate removal of OpenTracing compatibility content - No language-specific implementation mandates - No removal timeline policy in this PR (to be handled in follow-up discussion) ## Validation Local checks run: - `make markdownlint` ✅ - `make markdown-toc && git diff --exit-code ':*.md'` ✅ - `make cspell` ✅ Not run locally due environment limitation: - `make markdown-link-check` (requires Docker daemon) ## Notes for reviewers This is documentation/spec wording only and does not introduce API/SDK interfaces. --------- Co-authored-by: Amol Patil <9298683+adp2201@users.noreply.github.com> Co-authored-by: Carlos Alberto Cortez <calberto.cortez@gmail.com>

lmolkova requested review from a team as code owners October 29, 2025 23:13

Deprecate zipkin exporter

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lmolkova force-pushed the deprecate-zipkin branch from dfa9f8a to f81bd0c Compare October 29, 2025 23:17

clean up and lint

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lmolkova force-pushed the deprecate-zipkin branch from f783f16 to c2a913b Compare November 3, 2025 22:52

Merge branch 'main' into deprecate-zipkin

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pellared reviewed Nov 4, 2025

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lmolkova added 2 commits November 7, 2025 15:14

deprecate env vars, add changelog

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Merge branch 'main' into deprecate-zipkin

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lmolkova changed the title ~~[DO NOT MERGE] Deprecate Zipkin exporter~~ Deprecate Zipkin exporter Nov 7, 2025

lmolkova force-pushed the deprecate-zipkin branch from 7df53f5 to 53a264c Compare November 7, 2025 23:18

up

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lmolkova force-pushed the deprecate-zipkin branch from 53a264c to e2b9726 Compare November 7, 2025 23:18

reyang approved these changes Nov 7, 2025

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pellared approved these changes Nov 8, 2025

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Comment thread CHANGELOG.md Outdated

Comment thread specification/trace/sdk_exporters/zipkin.md Outdated

Comment thread specification/trace/sdk_exporters/zipkin.md Outdated

Comment thread spec-compliance-matrix.md

dashpole approved these changes Nov 9, 2025

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cijothomas approved these changes Nov 14, 2025

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lmolkova and others added 3 commits November 18, 2025 07:12

Apply suggestions from code review

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Co-authored-by: Robert Pająk <pellared@hotmail.com>

Merge branch 'main' into deprecate-zipkin

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nits

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lmolkova added 2 commits November 18, 2025 07:30

undo auto-toc

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nits

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up

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cijothomas mentioned this pull request Nov 18, 2025

Start deprecating Zipkin exporter open-telemetry/opentelemetry-rust#3250

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add deadline and details on artifact deprecation

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pichlermarc approved these changes Nov 19, 2025

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cijothomas reviewed Nov 19, 2025

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Comment thread specification/trace/sdk_exporters/zipkin.md

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Merge branch 'main' into deprecate-zipkin

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carlosalberto approved these changes Nov 21, 2025

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lmolkova added this pull request to the merge queue Nov 21, 2025

Merged via the queue into open-telemetry:main with commit 3e09510 Nov 21, 2025
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lmolkova deleted the deprecate-zipkin branch November 21, 2025 16:22

This was referenced Nov 21, 2025

Deprecate zipkin exporter open-telemetry/opentelemetry-java#7863

Open

Decide what to do about deprecated zipkin exporter and stability open-telemetry/opentelemetry-configuration#428

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lmolkova mentioned this pull request Nov 22, 2025

Add blog on zipkin deprecation open-telemetry/opentelemetry.io#8487

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carlosalberto mentioned this pull request Dec 5, 2025

Release 1.52.0 #4781

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This was referenced Jan 13, 2026

Remove ShardingSphere Agent support for Zipkin exporter apache/shardingsphere#37723

Open

Bump the Otel SDK and Otel Semantic Conventions version apache/shardingsphere#37717

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snicoll mentioned this pull request Mar 6, 2026

Provide advance warning of the deprecation and forthcoming removal of OpenTelemetry's ZipkinSpanExporter spring-projects/spring-boot#49453

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pellared mentioned this pull request Mar 11, 2026

Deprecate OpenTracing compatibility requirements #4849

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adp2201 mentioned this pull request Mar 11, 2026

Deprecate OpenTracing compatibility requirements #4938

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