spanly.com

What It Is

Spanly is an observability platform for Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers and AI Agents. It is not a replacement for general-purpose APM tools; instead, it complements tools such as Datadog, Sentry, and New Relic by adding MCP protocol semantics. Tool calls, prompts, resource reads, JSON-RPC requests and responses, latency, and errors can all be captured in searchable dashboards, with configurable alerts.

Core Features and Integrations

Based on the product copy, Spanly’s core value is that it “understands MCP.” It records raw JSON-RPC requests/responses, tool or resource names and parameters, HTTP context, client and server versions, errors, and stack traces. Integration options are fairly flexible: the TypeScript SDK supports Node, Bun, and Deno, while the Python SDK supports Python 3.10+. For Go, Rust, or other languages, you can wrap the binary with the CLI without changing code, and there are also proxy and Docker sidecar options. Spanly also supports OpenTelemetry: it can ingest MCP spans and export traces back to your existing APM. The SDK and CLI are open source under Apache 2.0, but the platform itself does not appear to provide open-source or self-hosting information.

Pricing

The Free plan includes 100,000 MCP requests per month, 30-day retention, and 2 seats, with sampling after the limit and no alerts. Pro is effectively $41/month when billed annually, with 90-day retention, unlimited seats, 10 alerts, and public dashboards. Business is effectively $210/month when billed annually, offering 12-month retention, 100 alerts, SAML/OIDC SSO, audit logs, and priority support. Overages on paid plans start at $6/100k and decrease by tier; usage above 30M requests/month requires enterprise pricing.

Pros and Cons

The strengths are its precise positioning, low integration overhead, clear Quickstart documentation, and ability to work alongside existing APM tools. Multi-region ingestion and US/EU regions are also helpful for data governance. The downsides are that it is tightly tied to MCP use cases, so it offers limited value for ordinary web services; the Free plan is mainly for evaluation; high-volume usage needs careful cost estimation; and there is no visible information about self-hosting options or supported payment methods.

Who It’s For and Access from China

Spanly is best suited for B2B SaaS companies, Agent platforms, and engineering teams that have already put MCP Servers into production and need on-call troubleshooting. The product copy does not specify availability or payment support from mainland China, so it is advisable to use the Free plan first to test network connectivity. Alternatives or complementary options include Datadog, Sentry, New Relic, and the OpenTelemetry ecosystem, but they do not directly cover MCP protocol-layer semantics.