Get Started with Embrace & Honeycomb

If your web or mobile applications use Embrace, you can forward metrics and network spans to Honeycomb. Sending your Embrace telemetry to Honeycomb lets you:

Analyze your mobile and web client telemetry and backend traces in one place
Go from a backend trace in Honeycomb to the originating Embrace session (emb.dashboard_session)
Set up trigger alerts or SLOs for web/mobile performance
Monitor frontend sessions and performance by creating a new board with the Embrace board template

Before you begin

Before starting, confirm you have:

A Honeycomb environment with at least one backend service sending OpenTelemetry traces
An Embrace account on an Enterprise plan
A mobile or web application using an Embrace SDK that supports network spans forwarding

If you haven’t added Embrace to your application, visit Embrace’s documentation for guides on how to install and set up the Embrace SDK for your platform:

Set up network spans forwarding

Network spans forwarding stitches Embrace client spans into your backend traces in Honeycomb. Network spans forwarded from Embrace will have a emb.dashboard_session link. This link connects a Honeycomb trace to the originating Embrace session.

Configure domains for network spans forwarding

Network spans forwarding requires you to specify which apps and domains to forward spans from. Configure this in the Embrace dashboard:

Navigate to Settings > Integrations.
Select the Network Spans Forwarding view.
Select Honeycomb as the data destination.
Select the apps you want to forward spans from.
Add the domain names of the backend services you want to trace.

Embrace forwards spans only for configured, internet-reachable domains. You can add domains as exact matches or use regex patterns for more flexible matching.

Create a Honeycomb Ingest Key

The Embrace SDK uses a Honeycomb Ingest Key to forward spans to your environment. If you already have an Ingest Key for this environment, you can use it here.To learn how to create a new Ingest Key, visit Manage Environment API Keys. When creating the key, enable Create datasets, so Embrace can create a dataset for the forwarded spans.You will use this key in the next step to configure the SDK exporter.

Configure the Embrace SDK exporter

The exporter tells the Embrace SDK where to send spans. Add a Honeycomb OTLP exporter to your Embrace SDK configuration, using your Ingest Key as the x-honeycomb-team header. Here is an example using the Embrace Web SDK:

import { EmbraceWebSDK } from '@embrace-io/web-sdk';

const embrace = new EmbraceWebSDK({
    appId: "YOUR_EMBRACE_APP_ID",
    appVersion: "YOUR_APP_VERSION",
    exporters: [{
        type: 'otlp',
        endpoint: 'https://api.honeycomb.io/v1/traces',
        headers: { 'x-honeycomb-team': YOUR_HONEYCOMB_INGEST_KEY }
    }]
});

if (embrace) {
    console.log("Successfully initialized the Embrace SDK");
    embrace.start();
} else {
    console.log("Failed to initialize the Embrace SDK");
}

The SDK automatically attaches a W3C traceparent header to every network request your app makes and forwards the resulting spans to Honeycomb with emb.* attributes included.

Set up metrics forwarding

Metrics forwarding sends session data from Embrace to Honeycomb, so you can query and alert on user experience signals alongside your backend traces.

Create a Honeycomb Configuration Key

Embrace uses a Honeycomb Configuration Key to authenticate when forwarding metrics to your environment. To learn how to create one, visit Manage Environment API Keys.

Add Honeycomb as a Data Destination in Embrace

Adding Honeycomb as a Data Destination tells Embrace where to send session metrics. In the Embrace dashboard:

Navigate to Settings > Integrations.
Select the Data Destinations view.
Select Add Data Destination.
Choose Honeycomb and enter your Honeycomb Configuration Key.

Once configured, Embrace forwards metrics to Honeycomb where you can query them alongside your trace data. To learn which metrics are forwarded, visit Embrace Integration Overview: Session Metrics.

Verify the integration

Verification confirms that both flows are working: spans appearing in the trace view means the SDK exporter is forwarding correctly, and metrics appearing in Honeycomb means the Data Destinations configuration is correct.

Network spans

Spans appear in Honeycomb after the SDK exporter is configured and application traffic flows through a configured domain.

In Honeycomb, open the dataset that corresponds to your backend service.
Run a query and filter for emb.app_id exists.
Select a result row and open the trace view.
Confirm that the trace includes a span labeled forwarded via Embrace at the top of the waterfall, with emb.* attributes visible in the span detail panel.
Confirm that emb.dashboard_session appears as a clickable link in the span detail panel.

If you don’t see spans after 15 minutes, refer to the troubleshooting section in Embrace’s network spans forwarding documentation.

Metrics

Metrics should appear in Honeycomb within a few minutes of adding it as a Data Destination.

In Honeycomb, open the dataset that corresponds to your Embrace metrics.
Run a query and filter for session.count exists.
Confirm that data is appearing.

Create a Board from the Embrace Dashboard template

Once you’ve verified your Embrace telemetry is showing up in Honeycomb, create a Board so you can see your Embrace stuff at a glance.

Select Boards () from the navigation menu.
Go to the Templates view, or select Create Boards and From Template.
Choose the Embrace Dashboard template.

In the template preview, review the data displayed in the query panels. If some queries aren’t displaying correctly, you may need to map required fields to your data:

Go to the Setup view.
Find any queries marked Unable to display.
In the Required fields column, select the target field, then choose the appropriate replacement field.
Your field mapping applies to all template queries using that target field. To revert to the original template field, select the remove icon () next to the replacement field name.
Repeat this process for any additional fields or queries.
Select Use Template.

Your new Embrace Board appears on the Boards page. Any queries marked as unable to display during creation are not included.

Next steps

Now that your Embrace integration is configured, put it to work:

Start Building

Observability Fundamentals

Honeycomb Basics

Plan + Design

Get Started with Embrace & Honeycomb

Before you begin

Set up network spans forwarding

Configure domains for network spans forwarding

Create a Honeycomb Ingest Key

Configure the Embrace SDK exporter

Set up metrics forwarding

Create a Honeycomb Configuration Key

Add Honeycomb as a Data Destination in Embrace

Verify the integration

Network spans

Metrics

Create a Board from the Embrace Dashboard template

Next steps

​Before you begin

​Set up network spans forwarding

Configure domains for network spans forwarding

Create a Honeycomb Ingest Key

Configure the Embrace SDK exporter

​Set up metrics forwarding

Create a Honeycomb Configuration Key

Add Honeycomb as a Data Destination in Embrace

​Verify the integration

​Network spans

​Metrics

​Create a Board from the Embrace Dashboard template

​Next steps

Before you begin

Set up network spans forwarding

Set up metrics forwarding

Verify the integration

Network spans

Metrics

Create a Board from the Embrace Dashboard template

Next steps