arize-phoenix-otel

Lightweight OpenTelemetry wrapper with Phoenix-aware defaults

Provides a lightweight wrapper around OpenTelemetry primitives with Phoenix-aware defaults. Also includes tracing decorators for common GenAI patterns.

Installation

pip install "arize-phoenix-otel>=0.16.0"

Starting in 0.16.0, phoenix.otel re-exports the OpenInference context managers and semantic conventions, so manual instrumentation no longer requires separately installing openinference-instrumentation or openinference-semantic-conventions. On older versions, import them from openinference.instrumentation and openinference.semconv.trace instead.

Quick Start

from phoenix.otel import register

tracer_provider = register()

That’s it! By default, register reads the PHOENIX_COLLECTOR_ENDPOINT environment variable, falling back to http://localhost:4317 using gRPC if the variable is not set.

Configuration

Environment Variables

The SDK automatically reads these environment variables:

Variable	Description
PHOENIX_COLLECTOR_ENDPOINT	Phoenix server URL
PHOENIX_PROJECT_NAME	Project name for traces
PHOENIX_API_KEY	API key (automatically adds auth header)
PHOENIX_CLIENT_HEADERS	Custom headers for requests
PHOENIX_GRPC_PORT	Override default gRPC port

# Environment variables are picked up automatically
# export PHOENIX_COLLECTOR_ENDPOINT=https://your-phoenix.com:6006
# export PHOENIX_API_KEY=your-api-key

from phoenix.otel import register

tracer_provider = register()

Endpoint Configuration

You can also configure the endpoint directly in code:

from phoenix.otel import register

# HTTP endpoint (must include full path)
tracer_provider = register(endpoint="http://localhost:6006/v1/traces")

# gRPC endpoint
tracer_provider = register(endpoint="http://localhost:4317")

# Force a specific protocol
tracer_provider = register(endpoint="http://localhost:9999", protocol="grpc")

When using the endpoint argument, you must specify the fully qualified URL. HTTP uses /v1/traces, while gRPC uses port 4317 by default.

Register Options

Parameter	Description
project_name	Phoenix project name (or PHOENIX_PROJECT_NAME env var)
endpoint	Collector endpoint URL
protocol	Transport protocol: "grpc" or "http/protobuf"
headers	Custom headers for requests
batch	Process spans in batch (default: False)
auto_instrument	Auto-instrument supported libraries

from phoenix.otel import register

tracer_provider = register(
    project_name="my-app",
    headers={"Authorization": "Bearer TOKEN"},
    batch=True,
    auto_instrument=True,
)

---

Spans may not be exported if still queued in the processor when your process exits. With batch=True, call tracer_provider.shutdown() to explicitly flush before exit. Alternatively, use batch=False for immediate export or a context manager (with register(...) as tracer_provider).

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Manual Instrumentation Helpers

phoenix.otel re-exports the OpenInference context managers and semantic conventions so you can add session, user, metadata, tag, prompt template, and suppression context — plus set OpenInference span attributes — from a single import:

from phoenix.otel import (
    # Context managers (usable as `with` blocks or decorators)
    suppress_tracing,
    using_attributes,
    using_metadata,
    using_prompt_template,
    using_session,
    using_tags,
    using_user,
    # OpenInference semantic conventions
    SpanAttributes,
    OpenInferenceSpanKindValues,
    OpenInferenceMimeTypeValues,
)

with using_session(session_id="abc-123"):
    # auto-instrumented spans inside this block inherit session.id
    ...

Requires arize-phoenix-otel>=0.16.0. Lower-level helpers (get_llm_attributes, TraceConfig, Message, Image, …) continue to live in the openinference-instrumentation package.

See Using Tracing Helpers for a full walkthrough of manual instrumentation.

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Advanced: OTel Primitives

For granular control, use Phoenix wrappers as drop-in replacements for OpenTelemetry primitives:

from opentelemetry import trace as trace_api
from phoenix.otel import HTTPSpanExporter, TracerProvider, SimpleSpanProcessor

tracer_provider = TracerProvider()
span_exporter = HTTPSpanExporter(endpoint="http://localhost:6006/v1/traces")
span_processor = SimpleSpanProcessor(span_exporter=span_exporter)
tracer_provider.add_span_processor(span_processor)
trace_api.set_tracer_provider(tracer_provider)

These wrappers accept an endpoint argument to automatically infer the appropriate SpanExporter.

More examples

Using environment variables:

# export PHOENIX_COLLECTOR_ENDPOINT=http://localhost:6006

from opentelemetry import trace as trace_api
from phoenix.otel import TracerProvider

tracer_provider = TracerProvider()
trace_api.set_tracer_provider(tracer_provider)

Custom resources:

from opentelemetry import trace as trace_api
from phoenix.otel import Resource, PROJECT_NAME, TracerProvider

tracer_provider = TracerProvider(resource=Resource({PROJECT_NAME: "my-project"}))
trace_api.set_tracer_provider(tracer_provider)

Batch processing:

from opentelemetry import trace as trace_api
from phoenix.otel import TracerProvider, BatchSpanProcessor

tracer_provider = TracerProvider()
tracer_provider.add_span_processor(BatchSpanProcessor())

Custom gRPC endpoint:

from opentelemetry import trace as trace_api
from phoenix.otel import TracerProvider, BatchSpanProcessor, GRPCSpanExporter

tracer_provider = TracerProvider()
batch_processor = BatchSpanProcessor(
    span_exporter=GRPCSpanExporter(endpoint="http://custom-endpoint.com:6789")
)
tracer_provider.add_span_processor(batch_processor)

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Advanced: TracerProvider Options

Both register() and TracerProvider accept standard OpenTelemetry TracerProvider kwargs for advanced features like custom ID generators and sampling:

from opentelemetry.sdk.extension.aws.trace import AwsXRayIdGenerator
from opentelemetry.sdk.trace.sampling import TraceIdRatioBased
from phoenix.otel import register

tracer_provider = register(
    project_name="my-app",
    id_generator=AwsXRayIdGenerator(),  # AWS X-Ray compatible IDs
    sampler=TraceIdRatioBased(0.1),     # Sample 10% of traces
)

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Reference Documentation

Full API Reference

Complete API documentation for tracing setup, decorators, and OpenTelemetry configuration