grafana/k6 · error

creating TracerProvider exporter: %w

Error message

creating TracerProvider exporter: %w

What it means

otlptrace.New could not create the span exporter from the freshly built client. This is the exporter-construction stage of NewTracerProvider; it fails on invalid exporter options or client setup problems, before the tracer provider is registered and before any connection to the collector is guaranteed.

Source

Thrown at internal/lib/trace/otel.go:73

func defaultTracerProviderParams() tracerProviderParams {
	return tracerProviderParams{
		proto:    "grpc",
		endpoint: "127.0.0.1:4317",
		insecure: true,
		headers:  make(map[string]string),
	}
}

// NewTracerProvider creates a new tracer provider.
func NewTracerProvider(ctx context.Context, params tracerProviderParams) (*TracerProvider, error) {
	client, err := newClient(params)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("creating TracerProvider exporter client: %w", err)
	}

	exporter, err := otlptrace.New(ctx, client)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("creating TracerProvider exporter: %w", err)
	}

	prov := sdktrace.NewTracerProvider(
		sdktrace.WithBatcher(exporter),
		sdktrace.WithResource(newResource()),
	)

	// Set a noop TracerProvider globally so usage of tracing
	// instrumentation is restricted to our own implementation
	otel.SetTracerProvider(NewNoopTracerProvider())

	return &TracerProvider{
		TracerProvider: prov,
		shutdown:       prov.Shutdown,
	}, nil
}

func newResource() *resource.Resource {

View on GitHub (pinned to 01ffac6f24)

Solutions

1. Validate the OTLP configuration line; retry with default settings (-o otel) to isolate the issue
2. Upgrade k6; exporter construction bugs are fixed over time
3. Check that the chosen client protocol and endpoint combination is supported by the collector

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at internal/lib/trace/otel.go:73 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

AI-assisted analysis of grafana/k6@01ffac6f24 (2026-08-18). Data as JSON: /api/errors/fd9f8a9754bb00ba. Report an issue: GitHub.