Axiom
A weekend of work, and real gaps remain.
Log and event storage priced to let you keep everything: ingest without sampling, query with a purpose-built language, and set alerts on the results.
For one application, keep logs yourself. For a fleet, do not. WHERE THE LINE IS - One or two services: SQLite or Postgres holds months of logs and queries them in milliseconds - A fleet with gigabytes a day: the storage engine is the product, keep paying STACK FOR THE SMALL CASE - Structured JSON logs to stdout, a shipper into Postgres, one query page STRUCTURE FIRST - Every log line is JSON with a level, a message, a request id and a timestamp - A request id threaded through everything is worth more than any query language STORING - One table, with the JSON payload in a jsonb column and the common fields extracted - Index the timestamp and the request id, nothing else at first RETENTION - A daily job deleting past N days, and a documented number - Without it the disk fills and the machine stops answering ALERTS - A saved query with a threshold, evaluated every minute, alerting once per incident Include the schema, the shipper and the retention job.
What you lose
- Storage economics that make keeping every log affordable, which is the whole pitch
- A query engine fast enough on months of data to be worth opening during an incident
- Ingest endpoints and shippers for every runtime already written
If you would rather not build
- Postgres with a jsonb column, for a single service
The escape hatch
open source · no votes, no paid placement
Vector
$0Collects, transforms and ships logs to whatever you store them in.
vectordotdev/vectorfree · open source
Why this verdict
our own opinion · changed only by a person
54/100
Verdict kinda at 54. One service worth of logs fits in Postgres comfortably; a fleet does not, and that is exactly where these products earn their price.
History
tracked since 10 Aug 2026 · nothing is ever overwritten
Nothing recorded yet. This chart fills in once the page has visitors, votes or prompt copies — it will not draw a flat line to look busy.
Questions about Axiom
answered from the record above
Is Axiom free?
No — the plan we track is $25 a month. From around $25/month billed monthly, priced on ingested volume, with a free allowance.
Can you replace Axiom by building your own?
ALMOST. A weekend of work, and real gaps remain. Replacement score 54 out of 100, build time a weekend. Read what you lose before you decide.
How much does Axiom cost?
$25 a month on Personal — $300 a year. Recorded 10 Aug 2026.
What do you lose by replacing Axiom?
Storage economics that make keeping every log affordable, which is the whole pitch; A query engine fast enough on months of data to be worth opening during an incident; Ingest endpoints and shippers for every runtime already written. If any of those carry weight for you, keep paying.
Is there an open-source alternative to Axiom?
Yes: Loki, Vector. The prompt on this page is for when you want it your way instead.
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