--- title: Service map description: Read your architecture as a dependency graph built from your traces. Coralogix APM offers a per-entity Service map section inside a service or database drilldown and a system-wide Map view of every service. url: https://coralogix.com/docs/user-guides/apm-v2/features/service-map/ product: apm feature: Service Map feature_id: service-map feature_identifier: apm/service-map last_updated: '2026-11-09' --- # Visualize your service dependencies The **Service map** section in an entity's drilldown draws that entity's dependencies as a graph, built from your [distributed traces](https://coralogix.com/docs/user-guides/data_exploration/spans.md) - so you read how a service or database actually talks to the rest of your system, not from a diagram you maintain by hand. It focuses on one entity's upstream and downstream dependencies. For a system-wide map of every service at once, use the catalog's [Map view](https://coralogix.com/docs/user-guides/apm-v2/services.md#map-view). Use it to: * **See your architecture as it really runs**: read a dependency graph drawn from real traffic, not a hand-maintained diagram. * **Trace a problem's blast radius**: follow the edges from a failing service to everything upstream and downstream of it. * **Spot a bottleneck**: find the service, database, or dependency that the most traffic flows through. * **Jump straight to the evidence**: open a service's overview, errors, or logs directly from the map. [![The Service map section in a drilldown: the service list on the left and the directed dependency graph, with the Databases, Caches, Messaging, and External node type chips checked in the lower-left corner](/docs/assets/images/service-map-drilldown-0b2fe58db3123544a7bba0d6fb508e08.webp)](https://coralogix.com/docs/assets/images/service-map-drilldown-0b2fe58db3123544a7bba0d6fb508e08.webp) ## What you need * Coralogix [Application Performance Monitoring (APM)](https://coralogix.com/docs/user-guides/apm-v2/getting-started/apm-onboarding-tutorial.md) installed and configured. * Span (trace) data. The map is drawn from spans, so send spans, not only [Span Metrics](https://coralogix.com/docs/user-guides/apm-v2/getting-started/span-metrics.md). * Archived span data for the time range you view, because the section samples archived traces. ## The Service map section in a drilldown Open a service or database drilldown and go to the **Service map** section to focus on one entity's dependencies. It presents a trace-based dependency analysis scoped to the entity you drilled into. While the section is collapsed, its header shows the entity's **Upstream** and **Downstream** neighbor counts. This section builds a **directed dependency graph** for the selected entity from a sample of up to **1,000 traces** taken from your **archived span data**. The graph centers on the drilled-into entity, with the services that call it (upstream) on one side and the services and dependencies it calls (downstream) on the other. A progress indicator reports how much of the sample has been processed (for example, "820/1,000 traces") and reads "Based on 1,000 traces" once the sample finishes. ### Service list A panel on the left lists every node in the graph with two columns - **Name** and **Request Volume** - sorted by volume. Use it to: * **Search**: filter the list by service name. * **All / Upstream / Downstream**: scope the graph to the entity's callers, its dependencies, or both. * Select a row to highlight and center its node in the graph. ### Node types Each node is labeled with its type: * **Service**: an instrumented service. * **Database**: a database dependency, labeled by system (for example, `postgresql`). * **Cache**: a cache such as Redis, Memcached, or Valkey. * **Messaging**: a messaging system, labeled by system and destination (for example, `kafka:orders`). * **External**: an uninstrumented HTTP or RPC endpoint, identified by its peer service or server address. A node shows its request or query count, any errors, and a high-load marker when its traffic is well above the graph's baseline. ### Filter nodes by type To focus on service-to-service dependencies, hide the node types you don't need. The **Node types** chips in the lower-left corner of the graph toggle **Databases**, **Caches**, **Messaging**, and **External** nodes. All four are checked by default. Clear a chip to hide those nodes and every edge connected to them. * Service nodes are always shown, and the entity you drilled into is never hidden, so a database drilldown keeps its own node. * The filter applies on top of the **All / Upstream / Downstream** scope. * The hidden types are kept in the page URL and in saved views, so a shared link or a saved view reopens the map with the same filter. A drilldown you open for another entity starts with every type shown. ### Node actions Open the menu on a node to jump to related views: * On a **service** node: **View service overview**, **View transactions** (when the service has transaction data), **View errors**, and **View related logs**. * On a **database** or **cache** node: **View database overview**. **View service overview** opens the service in an APM tab alongside the one you're in, landing on its **Overview** section and inheriting the current time range, environment, and comparison. If that service is already open in a tab, APM reuses it. Hold **Cmd/Ctrl** or **Shift** while selecting to open it in a browser tab instead. The other actions open in a new browser tab. ### Read a node or edge Hover a node to expand it into a card showing the node's icon - the language for a service, or the technology for a database, cache, queue, or external call - and per-connection metrics - **Req/s** (or **Q/s** for a database or cache), **Errors**, and **Max** latency - both for the node itself and for each of its connections. Hover an edge to see that call's **Requests** (or **Queries** to a database or cache), **Errors** (count and rate), **Avg latency**, and **Max latency**. Use the **Latency** selector to choose which latency the graph reports: **avg**, **min**, **max**, or **sum**. ### Graph controls A toolbar in the upper-right corner provides **zoom in**, **zoom out**, **fit view**, **toggle layout direction**, **toggle edge labels**, **export PNG**, and **export JSON**, and a minimap tracks your position. Hold **Cmd/Ctrl** and scroll to zoom the canvas. The graph re-centers on the drilled-into entity until you move the viewport yourself. Note The Service map section reads from archived span data. When the archive isn't enabled or has no data for the selected time range, the section shows *No archived traces found*, with the guidance: *This view relies on archived span data. Ensure archive is enabled and contains data for the selected time range.* ## Next steps See the resources a service runs on in [Infrastructure](https://coralogix.com/docs/user-guides/apm-v2/features/infrastructure.md). ## Additional resources * [Introduction to Application Performance Monitoring](https://coralogix.com/docs/user-guides/apm-v2/getting-started/apm-onboarding-tutorial.md) * [Explore spans](https://coralogix.com/docs/user-guides/data_exploration/spans.md)