diff --git a/docs/changelog.d/feature-otel-tracing.feature.md b/docs/changelog.d/feature-otel-tracing.feature.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5d5d4ab
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/changelog.d/feature-otel-tracing.feature.md
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+Add distributed tracing via Grafana Tempo and Beyla eBPF auto-instrumentation. Tempo runs on minikube-indri for trace storage, while a privileged Alloy DaemonSet on ringtail uses Beyla to instrument HTTP services (Frigate, ntfy, Ollama, Immich) without code changes. Grafana gets trace-to-log and trace-to-metrics correlation.
diff --git a/docs/reference/operations/observability.md b/docs/reference/operations/observability.md
index 6c42193..5890147 100644
--- a/docs/reference/operations/observability.md
+++ b/docs/reference/operations/observability.md
@@ -7,11 +7,12 @@ tags:
 
 # Observability
 
-Metrics, logs, and dashboards for BlumeOps infrastructure.
+Metrics, logs, traces, and dashboards for BlumeOps infrastructure.
 
 ## Components
 
 - [[prometheus]] - Metrics storage and querying
 - [[loki]] - Log aggregation
-- [[alloy|Alloy]] - Metrics and log collection
+- [[tempo]] - Distributed tracing
+- [[alloy|Alloy]] - Metrics, log, and trace collection
 - [[grafana]] - Dashboards and visualization
diff --git a/docs/reference/reference.md b/docs/reference/reference.md
index 9faa8e2..e9baa20 100644
--- a/docs/reference/reference.md
+++ b/docs/reference/reference.md
@@ -27,6 +27,7 @@ Individual service reference cards with URLs and configuration details.
 | [[jellyfin]] | Media server | indri |
 | [[kiwix]] | Offline Wikipedia & ZIM archives | k8s |
 | [[loki]] | Log aggregation | k8s |
+| [[tempo]] | Distributed tracing | k8s |
 | [[miniflux]] | RSS feed reader | k8s |
 | [[navidrome]] | Music streaming | k8s |
 | [[ntfy]] | Push notifications | k8s (ringtail) |
diff --git a/docs/reference/services/tempo.md b/docs/reference/services/tempo.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3aea029
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/reference/services/tempo.md
@@ -0,0 +1,60 @@
+---
+title: Tempo
+modified: 2026-03-05
+tags:
+  - service
+  - observability
+---
+
+# Grafana Tempo
+
+Distributed tracing backend for BlumeOps infrastructure. Receives traces via OTLP, stores them locally, and generates RED metrics (rate, error, duration) for [[prometheus]].
+
+## Quick Reference
+
+| Property | Value |
+|----------|-------|
+| **URL** | https://tempo.ops.eblu.me (when Caddy route added) |
+| **Tailscale URL** | https://tempo.tail8d86e.ts.net |
+| **OTLP Endpoint** | https://tempo-otlp.tail8d86e.ts.net |
+| **Namespace** | `monitoring` |
+| **Image** | `grafana/tempo:2.7.2` |
+| **Storage** | 10Gi PVC (local filesystem) |
+| **Retention** | 7 days |
+
+## Architecture
+
+- Single-node deployment with local filesystem storage
+- OTLP receivers: gRPC (4317) and HTTP (4318)
+- `metrics_generator` produces span-metrics and service-graphs, remote-written to [[prometheus]]
+- Queried via [[grafana]] Tempo datasource
+- Two Tailscale Ingresses: one for query API (3200), one for OTLP HTTP receiver (4318)
+
+## Trace Sources
+
+**From ringtail (via Beyla eBPF in Alloy):**
+
+| Service | Protocol | Coverage |
+|---------|----------|----------|
+| [[frigate]] | HTTP REST | Request rate, error rate, latency, trace spans |
+| [[ntfy]] | HTTP | Same |
+| [[ollama]] | HTTP REST | Same (model inference latency) |
+| [[immich]] | HTTP REST | Same |
+
+Beyla auto-instruments HTTP services via eBPF kernel hooks — no code changes needed. MQTT (Mosquitto) is not instrumented (no eBPF parser for MQTT).
+
+**Future: SDK instrumentation**
+Services with OTel SDK support (e.g., Hermes) can send traces directly to the OTLP endpoint for deeper internal spans (DB queries, business logic) alongside eBPF envelope traces.
+
+## Grafana Integration
+
+- **Tempo datasource** with trace-to-log and trace-to-metrics correlation
+- **Service map** and **node graph** visualization
+- **Loki derived fields** link trace IDs in logs back to Tempo
+
+## Related
+
+- [[alloy|Alloy]] - Trace collector (Beyla eBPF on ringtail)
+- [[prometheus]] - Receives span-metrics from Tempo
+- [[loki]] - Log correlation via trace IDs
+- [[grafana]] - Trace visualization