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For self-hosted .NET observability, instrument the application with OpenTelemetry, export telemetry over OTLP, and send it to a collector or monitoring backend that provides the storage and analysis you need. Aspire Service Defaults can supply a practical starting configuration—even without Aspire orchestration—while the Aspire Dashboard is best treated as a local development viewer: its telemetry is held in memory and subject to limits.
How the .NET observability stack fits together
OpenTelemetry connects .NET’s instrumentation APIs to systems that receive and analyze telemetry. The application and its libraries produce signals; OpenTelemetry collects and processes them; an exporter sends them to a destination that handles storage, querying, and visualization.
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| Signal | Common .NET source | What it represents |
|---|---|---|
| Logs | Microsoft.Extensions.Logging.ILogger<TCategoryName> |
Discrete records of application events. |
| Metrics | System.Diagnostics.Metrics.Meter |
Measurements that can be aggregated over time, such as counts or durations. |
| Traces | System.Diagnostics.ActivitySource and Activity |
Operations and their relationships as work moves across services. |
OpenTelemetry’s .NET documentation lists traces, metrics, and logs as stable: OpenTelemetry .NET documentation. Its package ecosystem includes the SDK, instrumentation libraries, and exporters. Microsoft describes the APIs above as instrumentation sources and OpenTelemetry as the collection and export layer: .NET observability with OpenTelemetry.
Why OTLP is the usual handoff
OTLP is a vendor-neutral protocol for transmitting telemetry from an application or collector to a receiver. Microsoft describes it as a “vendor neutral network protocol option for transmitting telemetry data.” In practical terms, it gives your .NET app a standard export path instead of tying instrumentation to one backend’s APIs or data structures. Some destinations also offer backend-specific exporters, so check the receiver’s supported protocols and features before choosing an export configuration.
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Configure the endpoint for the environment receiving the data. That may be a collector or monitoring service inside the deployment environment; it should not be assumed that a local development endpoint is also the right production destination. Aspire’s deployment guidance uses OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT for this purpose and notes that OTLP export is disabled if the endpoint is not configured: Aspire telemetry guidance.
Use Aspire Service Defaults as a starting point
Aspire Service Defaults bundle the OpenTelemetry SDK with ASP.NET, HttpClient, and runtime instrumentation packages, and configure OTLP export for the Aspire Dashboard. You can reuse the Service Defaults project in an application without adopting Aspire’s AppHost orchestration. That makes it a convenient starting point for standard .NET instrumentation and export configuration, rather than a requirement to run an Aspire-managed application: Aspire Service Defaults.
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Before relying on defaults, confirm which instrumentation and signals your application needs. A package being present does not by itself guarantee that every desired event, metric, or trace is collected; instrument application-specific operations where needed, and verify that the receiving system supports the signals you intend to send.
Keep the Aspire Dashboard in its proper role
The Aspire Dashboard is useful for inspecting OTLP telemetry during local development. Its telemetry storage is in memory, bounded by limits, and not a substitute for a separately selected durable backend and retention policy. When limits are reached, older values can be evicted; some incoming attributes and span events are truncated. These behaviors are documented in the Aspire Dashboard README.
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The dashboard can display sensitive resource configuration, environment variables, console logs, and telemetry. The README says standalone mode accepts incoming telemetry without authentication by default. Do not expose the dashboard or its OTLP receiver to untrusted networks without appropriate authentication and network controls. For deployment, point the application at a suitable local collector or monitoring service rather than treating the development dashboard as the production store.
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Microsoft’s .NET guidance points to examples involving Prometheus, Grafana, and Jaeger, and identifies Prometheus and Grafana among open-source monitoring and APM options. These are relevant candidates, not a universal recommendation: the available documentation does not establish a like-for-like comparison of their current durability, query capabilities, deployment effort, or operating costs. Aspire also cautions that integrations can differ in the telemetry features they support.
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- Persistence and retention: Determine whether the destination stores data durably and whether its retention meets your needs. A bounded in-memory viewer is useful for development, not a retention plan.
- Signal coverage: Check that the receiver can ingest and analyze the logs, traces, and metrics your team needs; support may vary by integration.
- Transport: Confirm that the receiver accepts the OTLP protocol and endpoint configuration you plan to use, or identify whether a backend-specific exporter is necessary.
- Security: Establish who can reach the user interface and telemetry receiver, how access is authenticated, and what network controls apply.
- Operating effort and deployment fit: Account for resource limits and ongoing operation, and place the collector or monitoring service where applications can reach it reliably within the target environment.
A practical deployment sequence
- Instrument the app. Use .NET’s logging, metrics, and activity APIs along with suitable OpenTelemetry instrumentation packages. Add application-specific instrumentation for important operations that automatic libraries do not cover.
- Choose the receiving system. Decide where telemetry will be stored and analyzed, and verify its signal coverage, persistence, OTLP support, access controls, and operational requirements.
- Configure export for each environment. Set the OTLP endpoint to the collector or monitoring service appropriate to that environment. Do not leave production dependent on a local dashboard endpoint.
- Verify end to end. Generate representative logs, metrics, and traces; confirm that each signal reaches the intended receiver and can be queried there. Check that the production endpoint and security boundaries are correct.
- Set retention and limits deliberately. Align the backend’s retention and resource configuration with the team’s operational needs. Do not infer production sizing from the Aspire Dashboard’s development defaults.
Version and support scope
The OpenTelemetry .NET project documentation says supported .NET and .NET Framework versions are supported, with .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 excluded. Runtime support and package behavior can change, so check the project documentation when selecting versions rather than relying on a fixed runtime list here: OpenTelemetry .NET support documentation.
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- Subscription-Free Personal Cloud – Store, back up, and manage all your videos, music, and photos and access them anytime without paying any monthly fees.
- Storage Purpose-Built for Data Security – A NAS designed to keep your data safe, the LS200 features a closed system to reduce vulnerabilities from 3rd party apps and SSL encryption for secure file transfers.
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