Sampling Strategy Misconfiguration Causing Blind Spots

warning

configurationUpdated Feb 23, 2026

Incorrect sampling configuration (especially default 1-in-1000 in legacy Jaeger SDKs) causes most traces to be dropped at the client, creating observability gaps that appear as missing spans in the backend.

Sources

Troubleshooting | Jaegerwww.jaegertracing.io

Troubleshootingdevelopers.openai.com

Technologies:

JaegerSymptoms of this issue are visible in Jaeger metrics and logs

How to detect:

Verify sampling strategy configuration via /api/sampling endpoint. Check for low trace ingestion rates combined with high application traffic. Remote sampling misconfigurations show as SDK failing to reach sampling service.

Recommended action:

For troubleshooting, set sampling to 100% (OTEL_TRACES_SAMPLER=parentbased_always_on or JAEGER_SAMPLER_TYPE=const with JAEGER_SAMPLER_PARAM=1). Verify remote sampling endpoint is reachable. Query /api/sampling?service=<name> to confirm strategy.