---
title: "Capture Spans from OpenTelemetry APIs"
description: "Let Sentry capture and send spans created by OpenTelemetry APIs."
url: https://docs.sentry.io/platforms/javascript/guides/nitro/opentelemetry/using-opentelemetry-apis/
---

# Capture Spans from OpenTelemetry APIs | Sentry for Nitro

To capture spans that your code or a library creates through `@opentelemetry/api`, set `enableOpenTelemetrySetup: true`. Sentry registers an OpenTelemetry-compatible tracer provider, context manager, and propagator. Spans created through `@opentelemetry/api` become native Sentry spans. Sentry's tracing configuration controls sampling and export.

```javascript
import * as Sentry from "<sdk-package-name>";
import { trace } from "@opentelemetry/api";

Sentry.init({
  dsn: "https://<key>@o<orgId>.ingest.sentry.io/<projectId>",
  enableOpenTelemetrySetup: true,
  tracesSampleRate: 1.0,
});

const tracer = trace.getTracer("my-app");

tracer.startActiveSpan("process-order", (span) => {
  try {
    // Your synchronous work here.
  } finally {
    span.end();
  }
});
```

Initialize Sentry before the application creates spans. This setup sends spans through Sentry's transport; it does not create an OTLP exporter. If your application already registers an OpenTelemetry provider, use [your own OpenTelemetry pipeline](https://docs.sentry.io/platforms/javascript/guides/nitro/opentelemetry/custom-setup.md) instead. Sentry will not replace an existing provider.

Most server SDKs leave `enableOpenTelemetrySetup` off by default. The `@sentry/nextjs` and `@sentry/sveltekit` SDKs enable it by default to capture spans emitted by those frameworks.