SplunkData Platform for Security, Observability & AI
vs
TempoOpen-source, high-scale distributed tracing backend
Comparison · Observability · weekly run Nov 3
Splunk vs Tempo
Which one do AI engines recommend, and how do they differ on price, fit and features?
The short answer
Splunk is the stronger AI pick in Observability: it has a visibility score of 22.5 versus 7.1 for Tempo, and ranks ahead in 29% of the answers that name both.
Choose Splunk if…
- You want the brand AI engines rank higher (22.5 vs 7.1)
- AI answers describe it more positively (21% vs 6% positive)
- You prefer a larger, established vendor (5,000+ employees)
- Strong log analytics and security data capabilities at enterprise scale
Choose Tempo if…
- You need SOC 2 or ISO/IEC 27001 or ISO 22301 or PCI DSS v4.0.1 or GDPR or FedRAMP High or TISAX or CSA STAR or TX-RAMP Level 2 coverage
- Open-source and cost-effective
- Mature Prometheus, Loki and Grafana ecosystem
- Distributed tracing for traces
AI visibility side by side
Latest weekly run · Nov 3
| Metric | Splunk | Tempo |
|---|---|---|
| Visibility score | 22.5% | 7.1% |
| Change vs last week | New | New |
| Rank in Observability | #6 | #12 |
| Share of voice | 5.8% | 3.1% |
| Mentions this run | 35 | 18 |
| Positive in AI answers | 21% | 6% |
The stronger value in each row is marked with a ✓.
Visibility score trend
Weekly runs over the last 60 days
Splunk 0pp · Tempo 0pp over 0 weekly runs.
Engine by engine
Splunk leads on 3 of 3 engines
ChatGPT
AI Mode
Perplexity
SplunkTempo
Head to head in AI answers
7 engine answers name both brands
2Splunk ranked higher
5Tempo ranked higher
| Prompt | Engine | Splunk | Tempo |
|---|---|---|---|
| What are the best observability tools in 2026? | ChatGPT | #9 | #6 |
| Best observability platform for enterprise | ChatGPT | #8 | #6 |
| Compare the leading observability platforms | ChatGPT | #4 | #10 |
| Compare the leading observability platforms | Perplexity | #11 | #9 |
| Alternatives to the most popular observability platform | ChatGPT | #12 | #6 |
| Alternatives to the most popular observability platform | Perplexity | #10 | #14 |
| Which observability platform offers a free trial? | AI Mode | #8 | #5 |
Features, pricing & fit
| Dimension | Splunk | Tempo |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Usage-based | — |
| Entry price | Free; paid from $15 / mo | — |
| Free plan | Yes | — |
| Deployment | Splunk Cloud Platform as SaaS, or Splunk Enterprise in a private cloud or on-premises, including air-gapped environments | Managed as Grafana Cloud or self-hosted on Kubernetes via Helm |
| Integrations | 2000+ | — |
| Compliance | — | SOC 2, ISO/IEC 27001, ISO 22301, PCI DSS v4.0.1, GDPR, FedRAMP High, TISAX, CSA STAR, TX-RAMP Level 2 |
| Support | Standard support included with product purchases, Premium support available, Support Portal for capacity changes | — |
| Founded | 2003 | — |
| Headquarters | San Francisco, California, US | New York, NY |
| Employees | 5,000+ | 1,001–5,000 |
| Funding | IPO | Series E · $1100M raised |
| Best for | SecOps, ITOps and engineering teams that run large volumes of machine data and need security and observability in one platform | — |
Plans side by side
Splunk
Infrastructure$15host/month billed annually
App & Infra$60host/month billed annually
End-to-End$75host/month billed annually
Tempo
Pricing not available.
Pros and cons
Themes from the AI answers that mention each brand
Splunk
- Strong log analytics and security data capabilities at enterprise scale
- Real-time infrastructure monitoring and application performance monitoring
- Free edition and trial available
- Incident alerting integration that routes and auto-resolves incidents
- Good fit for existing Splunk customers
- Complex, opaque, hard-to-predict pricing with surprise overage fees
Tempo
- Open-source and cost-effective
- Mature Prometheus, Loki and Grafana ecosystem
- Distributed tracing for traces
- Integrates smoothly with OpenTelemetry
- Managed option with a permanent free tier
- Demands significant internal engineering time to maintain and scale
Data collected ·ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Mode·coverage 100%·next run
Cite as: SlateIndex, “Splunk vs Tempo”, https://slateindex.ai/compare/splunk-vs-tempo, data of Nov 3, 2026. Licence: CC BY 4.0.