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The console exporter is the fastest way to verify your instrumentation is firing. No backend, no auth, no network — spans print straight to your terminal.

Switch the exporter type

When exporterType: 'console':
  • Trace exporter is ConsoleSpanExporter from @opentelemetry/sdk-trace-base.
  • No metric reader is attached — metrics are dropped silently. Use console for trace verification only.
  • Auth and endpoint config are ignored.

What you’ll see

Each span prints as JSON when it ends:
This is the same data the OTLP exporter would ship — just rendered locally.

Use cases

Verify a new tool

Confirm spans appear with the right attributes before pointing at prod.

Debug a custom span

See exactly what your startActiveSpan calls are emitting.

Test redaction

Run with enableArgumentCollection: true + your dataProcessors and inspect the printed attributes.

CI smoke test

Run a sample tool call in CI and grep for expected attributes.

Sample CI assertion

test/smoke.ts

When you’re ready for the real backend

Switch to otlp-http (or remove exporterType entirely — it’s the default):

Next

Authentication

Wire up the live exporter.

Troubleshooting

Common issues and fixes.