What is OpenTelemetry? LLM Observability with OpenLIT Explained

September 29, 2026

What is OpenTelemetry, and how does OpenLIT use it for LLM observability? Docs: https://docs.openlit.io GitHub: https://github.com/openlit/openlit Site: https://openlit.io OTLP receiver docs: https://docs.openlit.io/latest/openlit/otlp-receiver OpenTelemetry (OTel) is the open, vendor-neutral CNCF standard for traces, metrics, and logs. It gives you one protocol (OTLP), language SDKs, and the OpenTelemetry Collector, so you can instrument once and send your telemetry anywhere. OpenLIT is built natively on OpenTelemetry. Add one line, openlit.init(), and it auto-instruments your LLMs, vector databases, AI agent frameworks, and GPUs. Every span follows the OpenTelemetry GenAI semantic conventions, so your LLM monitoring data works in OpenLIT or any OTel backend like Grafana or Jaeger. No vendor lock-in. The OpenLIT platform also includes a built-in OTLP receiver (gRPC 4317, HTTP 4318), so any OpenTelemetry source can send straight to it. Open source and self-hosted. Chapters: 0:00 What is OpenTelemetry 0:14 OpenLIT: one-line auto-instrumentation 0:27 Export anywhere + built-in OTLP receiver #OpenTelemetry #LLMObservability #OpenLIT #GenAI