New Relic
The Trade Desk
| Feature | New Relic | The Trade Desk |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free / from $0.3/mo | Contact sales |
| Free Plan | ✓ Yes | ✗ No |
| Rating | 4.3 / 5 | 4.5 / 5 |
| Best For | development-teams, sre-teams, startups, devops-engineers | media-buyers, agencies, enterprise-advertisers, programmatic-teams |
| Founded | 2008 | 2009 |
| Apm | ✓ | ✗ |
| Infrastructure Monitoring | ✓ | ✗ |
| Log Management | ✓ | ✗ |
| Browser Monitoring | ✓ | ✗ |
| Synthetics | ✓ | ✗ |
| Ai Assistant | ✓ | ✗ |
| Distributed Tracing | ✓ | ✗ |
| Error Tracking | ✓ | ✗ |
| Programmatic Buying | ✗ | ✓ |
| Connected Tv | ✗ | ✓ |
| Audio Ads | ✗ | ✓ |
| Data Marketplace | ✗ | ✓ |
| Attribution | ✗ | ✓ |
| Identity Graph | ✗ | ✓ |
✓ New Relic Pros
- Generous free tier with 100GB/month data ingest
- Full-stack observability in one platform
- Usage-based pricing is cost-effective for many teams
- Strong AI assistant (New Relic AI) for troubleshooting
✗ New Relic Cons
- Per-user pricing for full platform access
- Data retention limits on free tier
- Can be complex to set up comprehensively
✓ The Trade Desk Pros
- Best-in-class DSP technology
- Excellent CTV capabilities
- Strong data marketplace
- Transparent pricing
✗ The Trade Desk Cons
- Enterprise minimum spend
- Requires programmatic expertise
- Complex for beginners
The Verdict
New Relic is built for development teams and sre teams, with a focus on apm and infrastructure-monitoring. The Trade Desk targets media buyers and agencies and leads with programmatic-buying and connected-tv.
The Trade Desk uses custom enterprise pricing, while New Relic starts at $0.3/mo — a tangible advantage for teams with a fixed budget.
New Relic has a free plan, which gives it a meaningful edge for individuals and small teams exploring their options. The Trade Desk requires a paid subscription from day one.
Feature-wise, New Relic offers broader built-in capabilities (8 features vs 6), while The Trade Desk takes a more focused approach — which can mean a simpler, faster onboarding experience.
This is a genuinely close comparison. If you can, sign up for both free trials (where available) and run a one-week test with your actual team tasks before deciding.