Gen AI

• GenAI Attributes
• Deprecated GenAI Attributes
• Deprecated OpenAI GenAI Attributes

GenAI Attributes

This document defines the attributes used to describe telemetry in the context of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) Models requests and responses.

Attributes:

Key	Stability	Value Type	Description	Example Values
gen_ai.agent.description		string	Free-form description of the GenAI agent provided by the application.	Helps with math problems; Generates fiction stories
gen_ai.agent.id		string	The unique identifier of the GenAI agent.	asst_5j66UpCpwteGg4YSxUnt7lPY
gen_ai.agent.name		string	Human-readable name of the GenAI agent provided by the application.	Math Tutor; Fiction Writer
gen_ai.conversation.id		string	The unique identifier for a conversation (session, thread), used to store and correlate messages within this conversation.	conv_5j66UpCpwteGg4YSxUnt7lPY
gen_ai.data_source.id		string	The data source identifier. [1]	H7STPQYOND
gen_ai.embeddings.dimension.count		int	The number of dimensions the resulting output embeddings should have.	512; 1024
gen_ai.evaluation.explanation		string	A free-form explanation for the assigned score provided by the evaluator.	The response is factually accurate but lacks sufficient detail to fully address the question.
gen_ai.evaluation.name		string	The name of the evaluation metric used for the GenAI response.	Relevance; IntentResolution
gen_ai.evaluation.score.label		string	Human readable label for evaluation. [2]	relevant; not_relevant; correct; incorrect; pass; fail
gen_ai.evaluation.score.value		double	The evaluation score returned by the evaluator.	4.0
gen_ai.input.messages		any	The chat history provided to the model as an input. [3]	[   {     “role”: “user”,     “parts”: [       {         “type”: “text”,         “content”: “Weather in Paris?"       }     ]   },   {     “role”: “assistant”,     “parts”: [       {         “type”: “tool_call”,         “id”: “call_VSPygqKTWdrhaFErNvMV18Yl”,         “name”: “get_weather”,         “arguments”: {           “location”: “Paris”         }       }     ]   },   {     “role”: “tool”,     “parts”: [       {         “type”: “tool_call_response”,         “id”: " call_VSPygqKTWdrhaFErNvMV18Yl”,         “result”: “rainy, 57°F”       }     ]   } ]
gen_ai.operation.name		string	The name of the operation being performed. [4]	chat; generate_content; text_completion
gen_ai.output.messages		any	Messages returned by the model where each message represents a specific model response (choice, candidate). [5]	[   {     “role”: “assistant”,     “parts”: [       {         “type”: “text”,         “content”: “The weather in Paris is currently rainy with a temperature of 57°F."       }     ],     “finish_reason”: “stop”   } ]
gen_ai.output.type		string	Represents the content type requested by the client. [6]	text; json; image
gen_ai.provider.name		string	The Generative AI provider as identified by the client or server instrumentation. [7]	openai; gcp.gen_ai; gcp.vertex_ai
gen_ai.request.choice.count		int	The target number of candidate completions to return.	3
gen_ai.request.encoding_formats		string[]	The encoding formats requested in an embeddings operation, if specified. [8]	["base64"]; ["float", "binary"]
gen_ai.request.frequency_penalty		double	The frequency penalty setting for the GenAI request.	0.1
gen_ai.request.max_tokens		int	The maximum number of tokens the model generates for a request.	100
gen_ai.request.model		string	The name of the GenAI model a request is being made to.	gpt-4
gen_ai.request.presence_penalty		double	The presence penalty setting for the GenAI request.	0.1
gen_ai.request.seed		int	Requests with same seed value more likely to return same result.	100
gen_ai.request.stop_sequences		string[]	List of sequences that the model will use to stop generating further tokens.	["forest", "lived"]
gen_ai.request.temperature		double	The temperature setting for the GenAI request.	0.0
gen_ai.request.top_k		double	The top_k sampling setting for the GenAI request.	1.0
gen_ai.request.top_p		double	The top_p sampling setting for the GenAI request.	1.0
gen_ai.response.finish_reasons		string[]	Array of reasons the model stopped generating tokens, corresponding to each generation received.	["stop"]; ["stop", "length"]
gen_ai.response.id		string	The unique identifier for the completion.	chatcmpl-123
gen_ai.response.model		string	The name of the model that generated the response.	gpt-4-0613
gen_ai.system_instructions		any	The system message or instructions provided to the GenAI model separately from the chat history. [9]	[   {     “type”: “text”,     “content”: “You are an Agent that greet users, always use greetings tool to respond”   } ]; [   {     “type”: “text”,     “content”: “You are a language translator."   },   {     “type”: “text”,     “content”: “Your mission is to translate text in English to French."   } ]
gen_ai.token.type		string	The type of token being counted.	input; output
gen_ai.tool.call.arguments		any	Parameters passed to the tool call. [10]	{     “location”: “San Francisco?”,     “date”: “2025-10-01” }
gen_ai.tool.call.id		string	The tool call identifier.	call_mszuSIzqtI65i1wAUOE8w5H4
gen_ai.tool.call.result		any	The result returned by the tool call (if any and if execution was successful). [11]	{   “temperature_range”: {     “high”: 75,     “low”: 60   },   “conditions”: “sunny” }
gen_ai.tool.definitions		any	The list of source system tool definitions available to the GenAI agent or model. [12]	[   {     “type”: “function”,     “name”: “get_current_weather”,     “description”: “Get the current weather in a given location”,     “parameters”: {       “type”: “object”,       “properties”: {         “location”: {           “type”: “string”,           “description”: “The city and state, e.g. San Francisco, CA”         },         “unit”: {           “type”: “string”,           “enum”: [             “celsius”,             “fahrenheit”           ]         }       },       “required”: [         “location”,         “unit”       ]     }   } ]
gen_ai.tool.description		string	The tool description.	Multiply two numbers
gen_ai.tool.name		string	Name of the tool utilized by the agent.	Flights
gen_ai.tool.type		string	Type of the tool utilized by the agent [13]	function; extension; datastore
gen_ai.usage.input_tokens		int	The number of tokens used in the GenAI input (prompt).	100
gen_ai.usage.output_tokens		int	The number of tokens used in the GenAI response (completion).	180

[1] gen_ai.data_source.id: Data sources are used by AI agents and RAG applications to store grounding data. A data source may be an external database, object store, document collection, website, or any other storage system used by the GenAI agent or application. The gen_ai.data_source.id SHOULD match the identifier used by the GenAI system rather than a name specific to the external storage, such as a database or object store. Semantic conventions referencing gen_ai.data_source.id MAY also leverage additional attributes, such as db.*, to further identify and describe the data source.

[2] gen_ai.evaluation.score.label: This attribute provides a human-readable interpretation of the evaluation score produced by an evaluator. For example, a score value of 1 could mean “relevant” in one evaluation system and “not relevant” in another, depending on the scoring range and evaluator. The label SHOULD have low cardinality. Possible values depend on the evaluation metric and evaluator used; implementations SHOULD document the possible values.

[3] gen_ai.input.messages: Instrumentations MUST follow Input messages JSON schema. When the attribute is recorded on events, it MUST be recorded in structured form. When recorded on spans, it MAY be recorded as a JSON string if structured format is not supported and SHOULD be recorded in structured form otherwise.

Messages MUST be provided in the order they were sent to the model. Instrumentations MAY provide a way for users to filter or truncate input messages.

[!Warning] This attribute is likely to contain sensitive information including user/PII data.

See Recording content on attributes section for more details.

[4] gen_ai.operation.name: If one of the predefined values applies, but specific system uses a different name it’s RECOMMENDED to document it in the semantic conventions for specific GenAI system and use system-specific name in the instrumentation. If a different name is not documented, instrumentation libraries SHOULD use applicable predefined value.

[5] gen_ai.output.messages: Instrumentations MUST follow Output messages JSON schema

Each message represents a single output choice/candidate generated by the model. Each message corresponds to exactly one generation (choice/candidate) and vice versa - one choice cannot be split across multiple messages or one message cannot contain parts from multiple choices.

When the attribute is recorded on events, it MUST be recorded in structured form. When recorded on spans, it MAY be recorded as a JSON string if structured format is not supported and SHOULD be recorded in structured form otherwise.

Instrumentations MAY provide a way for users to filter or truncate output messages.

[!Warning] This attribute is likely to contain sensitive information including user/PII data.

See Recording content on attributes section for more details.

[6] gen_ai.output.type: This attribute SHOULD be used when the client requests output of a specific type. The model may return zero or more outputs of this type. This attribute specifies the output modality and not the actual output format. For example, if an image is requested, the actual output could be a URL pointing to an image file. Additional output format details may be recorded in the future in the gen_ai.output.{type}.* attributes.

[7] gen_ai.provider.name: The attribute SHOULD be set based on the instrumentation’s best knowledge and may differ from the actual model provider.

Multiple providers, including Azure OpenAI, Gemini, and AI hosting platforms are accessible using the OpenAI REST API and corresponding client libraries, but may proxy or host models from different providers.

The gen_ai.request.model, gen_ai.response.model, and server.address attributes may help identify the actual system in use.

The gen_ai.provider.name attribute acts as a discriminator that identifies the GenAI telemetry format flavor specific to that provider within GenAI semantic conventions. It SHOULD be set consistently with provider-specific attributes and signals. For example, GenAI spans, metrics, and events related to AWS Bedrock should have the gen_ai.provider.name set to aws.bedrock and include applicable aws.bedrock.* attributes and are not expected to include openai.* attributes.

[8] gen_ai.request.encoding_formats: In some GenAI systems the encoding formats are called embedding types. Also, some GenAI systems only accept a single format per request.

[9] gen_ai.system_instructions: This attribute SHOULD be used when the corresponding provider or API allows to provide system instructions or messages separately from the chat history.

Instructions that are part of the chat history SHOULD be recorded in gen_ai.input.messages attribute instead.

Instrumentations MUST follow System instructions JSON schema.

When recorded on spans, it MAY be recorded as a JSON string if structured format is not supported and SHOULD be recorded in structured form otherwise.

Instrumentations MAY provide a way for users to filter or truncate system instructions.

[!Warning] This attribute may contain sensitive information.

See Recording content on attributes section for more details.

[10] gen_ai.tool.call.arguments: > [!WARNING]

This attribute may contain sensitive information.

It’s expected to be an object - in case a serialized string is available to the instrumentation, the instrumentation SHOULD do the best effort to deserialize it to an object. When recorded on spans, it MAY be recorded as a JSON string if structured format is not supported and SHOULD be recorded in structured form otherwise.

[11] gen_ai.tool.call.result: > [!WARNING]

This attribute may contain sensitive information.

It’s expected to be an object - in case a serialized string is available to the instrumentation, the instrumentation SHOULD do the best effort to deserialize it to an object. When recorded on spans, it MAY be recorded as a JSON string if structured format is not supported and SHOULD be recorded in structured form otherwise.

[12] gen_ai.tool.definitions: The value of this attribute matches source system tool definition format.

It’s expected to be an array of objects where each object represents a tool definition. In case a serialized string is available to the instrumentation, the instrumentation SHOULD do the best effort to deserialize it to an array. When recorded on spans, it MAY be recorded as a JSON string if structured format is not supported and SHOULD be recorded in structured form otherwise.

Since this attribute could be large, it’s NOT RECOMMENDED to populate it by default. Instrumentations MAY provide a way to enable populating this attribute.

[13] gen_ai.tool.type: Extension: A tool executed on the agent-side to directly call external APIs, bridging the gap between the agent and real-world systems. Agent-side operations involve actions that are performed by the agent on the server or within the agent’s controlled environment. Function: A tool executed on the client-side, where the agent generates parameters for a predefined function, and the client executes the logic. Client-side operations are actions taken on the user’s end or within the client application. Datastore: A tool used by the agent to access and query structured or unstructured external data for retrieval-augmented tasks or knowledge updates.

gen_ai.operation.name has the following list of well-known values. If one of them applies, then the respective value MUST be used; otherwise, a custom value MAY be used.

Value	Description	Stability
chat	Chat completion operation such as OpenAI Chat API
create_agent	Create GenAI agent
embeddings	Embeddings operation such as OpenAI Create embeddings API
execute_tool	Execute a tool
generate_content	Multimodal content generation operation such as Gemini Generate Content
invoke_agent	Invoke GenAI agent
text_completion	Text completions operation such as OpenAI Completions API (Legacy)

gen_ai.output.type has the following list of well-known values. If one of them applies, then the respective value MUST be used; otherwise, a custom value MAY be used.

Value	Description	Stability
image	Image
json	JSON object with known or unknown schema
speech	Speech
text	Plain text

gen_ai.provider.name has the following list of well-known values. If one of them applies, then the respective value MUST be used; otherwise, a custom value MAY be used.

Value	Description	Stability
anthropic	Anthropic
aws.bedrock	AWS Bedrock
azure.ai.inference	Azure AI Inference
azure.ai.openai	Azure OpenAI
cohere	Cohere
deepseek	DeepSeek
gcp.gemini	Gemini [14]
gcp.gen_ai	Any Google generative AI endpoint [15]
gcp.vertex_ai	Vertex AI [16]
groq	Groq
ibm.watsonx.ai	IBM Watsonx AI
mistral_ai	Mistral AI
openai	OpenAI
perplexity	Perplexity
x_ai	xAI

[14]: Used when accessing the ‘generativelanguage.googleapis.com’ endpoint. Also known as the AI Studio API.

[15]: May be used when specific backend is unknown.

[16]: Used when accessing the ‘aiplatform.googleapis.com’ endpoint.

gen_ai.token.type has the following list of well-known values. If one of them applies, then the respective value MUST be used; otherwise, a custom value MAY be used.

Value	Description	Stability
input	Input tokens (prompt, input, etc.)
output	Output tokens (completion, response, etc.)

Deprecated GenAI Attributes

Describes deprecated gen_ai attributes.

Attributes:

Key	Stability	Value Type	Description	Example Values
gen_ai.completion	Removed, no replacement at this time.	string	Deprecated, use Event API to report completions contents.	[{'role': 'assistant', 'content': 'The capital of France is Paris.'}]
gen_ai.prompt	Removed, no replacement at this time.	string	Deprecated, use Event API to report prompt contents.	[{'role': 'user', 'content': 'What is the capital of France?'}]
gen_ai.system	Replaced by gen_ai.provider.name.	string	Deprecated, use gen_ai.provider.name instead.	openai; gcp.gen_ai; gcp.vertex_ai
gen_ai.usage.completion_tokens	Replaced by gen_ai.usage.output_tokens.	int	Deprecated, use gen_ai.usage.output_tokens instead.	42
gen_ai.usage.prompt_tokens	Replaced by gen_ai.usage.input_tokens.	int	Deprecated, use gen_ai.usage.input_tokens instead.	42

gen_ai.system has the following list of well-known values. If one of them applies, then the respective value MUST be used; otherwise, a custom value MAY be used.

Value	Description	Stability
anthropic	Anthropic
aws.bedrock	AWS Bedrock
azure.ai.inference	Azure AI Inference
azure.ai.openai	Azure OpenAI
cohere	Cohere
deepseek	DeepSeek
gcp.gemini	Gemini [17]
gcp.gen_ai	Any Google generative AI endpoint [18]
gcp.vertex_ai	Vertex AI [19]
groq	Groq
ibm.watsonx.ai	IBM Watsonx AI
mistral_ai	Mistral AI
openai	OpenAI
perplexity	Perplexity
xai	xAI

[17]: This refers to the ‘generativelanguage.googleapis.com’ endpoint. Also known as the AI Studio API. May use common attributes prefixed with ‘gcp.gen_ai.’.

[18]: May be used when specific backend is unknown. May use common attributes prefixed with ‘gcp.gen_ai.’.

[19]: This refers to the ‘aiplatform.googleapis.com’ endpoint. May use common attributes prefixed with ‘gcp.gen_ai.’.

Deprecated OpenAI GenAI Attributes

Describes deprecated gen_ai.openai attributes.

Attributes:

Key	Stability	Value Type	Description	Example Values
gen_ai.openai.request.response_format	Replaced by gen_ai.output.type.	string	Deprecated, use gen_ai.output.type.	text; json_object; json_schema
gen_ai.openai.request.seed	Replaced by gen_ai.request.seed.	int	Deprecated, use gen_ai.request.seed.	100
gen_ai.openai.request.service_tier	Replaced by openai.request.service_tier.	string	Deprecated, use openai.request.service_tier.	auto; default
gen_ai.openai.response.service_tier	Replaced by openai.response.service_tier.	string	Deprecated, use openai.response.service_tier.	scale; default
gen_ai.openai.response.system_fingerprint	Replaced by openai.response.system_fingerprint.	string	Deprecated, use openai.response.system_fingerprint.	fp_44709d6fcb

gen_ai.openai.request.response_format has the following list of well-known values. If one of them applies, then the respective value MUST be used; otherwise, a custom value MAY be used.

Value	Description	Stability
json_object	JSON object response format
json_schema	JSON schema response format
text	Text response format

gen_ai.openai.request.service_tier has the following list of well-known values. If one of them applies, then the respective value MUST be used; otherwise, a custom value MAY be used.

Value	Description	Stability
auto	The system will utilize scale tier credits until they are exhausted.
default	The system will utilize the default scale tier.