tracekit-react-sdk

Sets up TraceKit APM in React applications with error boundaries, component performance tracking, and distributed tracing. Use when the user asks to add TraceKit, add observability, instrument a React app, or configure APM in a React/TypeScript project.

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Install skill "tracekit-react-sdk" with this command: npx skills add tracekit-dev/tracekit-for-ai/tracekit-dev-tracekit-for-ai-tracekit-react-sdk

TraceKit React SDK Setup

When To Use

Use this skill when the user asks to:

  • Add TraceKit to a React application
  • Add observability or APM to a React app
  • Instrument a React project with error tracking or distributed tracing
  • Configure TraceKit API keys in a React project
  • Set up error boundaries with automatic error reporting
  • Add performance monitoring to a React app
  • Debug production React apps with live breakpoints

Not React? If the user is using Vue, Angular, Next.js, Nuxt, or a plain JS/TS project without a framework, use the corresponding skill instead.

Non-Negotiable Rules

  1. Never hardcode API keys in code. Always use environment variables or build-time injection (e.g., import.meta.env.VITE_TRACEKIT_API_KEY).
  2. Always include a verification step confirming errors and traces appear in https://app.tracekit.dev/traces.
  3. Always enable code monitoring (enableCodeMonitoring: true) — it is TraceKit's differentiator for live debugging.
  4. Always init TraceKit before any other application code — the provider must wrap the entire app at the root level.

Detection

Before applying this skill, detect the project type:

  1. Check for package.json — confirms this is a JavaScript/TypeScript project.
  2. Check for react-dom in dependencies or devDependencies — confirms this is a React project.
  3. Check for Next.js: If next is in dependencies, use the tracekit-nextjs-sdk skill instead.
  4. Detect build tool for env var pattern:
    • CRA (react-scripts in dependencies) => REACT_APP_TRACEKIT_API_KEY via process.env
    • Vite (vite in devDependencies) => VITE_TRACEKIT_API_KEY via import.meta.env
  5. Check for TypeScript: tsconfig.json presence means use .tsx snippets.
  6. Only ask the user if react-dom is not found but React-like code exists.

Step 1: Environment Setup

Set the TRACEKIT_API_KEY environment variable. This is the only required secret.

Add to your .env file:

Vite projects:

VITE_TRACEKIT_API_KEY=ctxio_your_api_key_here

Create React App projects:

REACT_APP_TRACEKIT_API_KEY=ctxio_your_api_key_here

Where to get your API key:

  1. Log in to TraceKit
  2. Go to API Keys page
  3. Generate a new key (starts with ctxio_)

Do not commit real API keys. Use .env files, deployment secret managers, or CI variables.

Step 2: Install SDK

npm install @tracekit/react

Or with Yarn:

yarn add @tracekit/react

This installs the TraceKit React SDK which wraps @tracekit/browser with React-specific integrations: error boundaries, provider pattern, performance hooks, and router breadcrumbs. You only need this one package.

Step 3: Initialize TraceKit Provider

Wrap your app root in <TraceKitProvider>. This initializes the SDK and provides context to all child components.

Vite + React

// src/main.tsx
import React from 'react';
import ReactDOM from 'react-dom/client';
import { TraceKitProvider } from '@tracekit/react';
import App from './App';

ReactDOM.createRoot(document.getElementById('root')!).render(
  <React.StrictMode>
    <TraceKitProvider
      config={{
        apiKey: import.meta.env.VITE_TRACEKIT_API_KEY,
        serviceName: 'my-react-app',
        endpoint: 'https://app.tracekit.dev/v1/traces',
        enableCodeMonitoring: true,
        release: import.meta.env.VITE_APP_VERSION || '0.0.0',
        environment: import.meta.env.MODE,
      }}
    >
      <App />
    </TraceKitProvider>
  </React.StrictMode>
);

Create React App

// src/index.tsx
import React from 'react';
import ReactDOM from 'react-dom/client';
import { TraceKitProvider } from '@tracekit/react';
import App from './App';

ReactDOM.createRoot(document.getElementById('root')!).render(
  <React.StrictMode>
    <TraceKitProvider
      config={{
        apiKey: process.env.REACT_APP_TRACEKIT_API_KEY!,
        serviceName: 'my-react-app',
        endpoint: 'https://app.tracekit.dev/v1/traces',
        enableCodeMonitoring: true,
        release: process.env.REACT_APP_VERSION || '0.0.0',
        environment: process.env.NODE_ENV,
      }}
    >
      <App />
    </TraceKitProvider>
  </React.StrictMode>
);

Key points:

  • TraceKitProvider must be the outermost wrapper (before Router, Redux, etc.)
  • The provider calls init() internally — do not call init() separately
  • serviceName should match your app's logical name (e.g., "dashboard", "checkout")

Step 4: Error Boundary

Wrap component trees with <TraceKitErrorBoundary> to capture React render errors. The error boundary automatically calls captureException with component stack traces.

import { TraceKitErrorBoundary } from '@tracekit/react';

function ErrorFallback({ error, resetError }: { error: Error; resetError: () => void }) {
  return (
    <div role="alert" style={{ padding: '2rem', textAlign: 'center' }}>
      <h2>Something went wrong</h2>
      <p style={{ color: '#666' }}>{error.message}</p>
      <button
        onClick={resetError}
        style={{ marginTop: '1rem', padding: '0.5rem 1rem', cursor: 'pointer' }}
      >
        Try again
      </button>
    </div>
  );
}

// Wrap your app or specific route sections
function App() {
  return (
    <TraceKitErrorBoundary fallback={(error, _componentStack, resetError) => (
      <ErrorFallback error={error} resetError={resetError} />
    )}>
      <Dashboard />
    </TraceKitErrorBoundary>
  );
}

Nesting error boundaries — wrap different sections for granular recovery:

function App() {
  return (
    <div>
      <Header /> {/* Errors here bubble up to root */}
      <TraceKitErrorBoundary fallback={<p>Dashboard failed to load</p>}>
        <Dashboard />
      </TraceKitErrorBoundary>
      <TraceKitErrorBoundary fallback={<p>Sidebar failed to load</p>}>
        <Sidebar />
      </TraceKitErrorBoundary>
    </div>
  );
}

Important: React error boundaries only catch errors during rendering, lifecycle methods, and constructors. They do NOT catch errors in event handlers, async code, or setTimeout. Use captureException for those:

import { captureException } from '@tracekit/react';

function SubmitButton() {
  const handleClick = async () => {
    try {
      await submitForm();
    } catch (err) {
      captureException(err as Error, { component: 'SubmitButton' });
    }
  };
  return <button onClick={handleClick}>Submit</button>;
}

Step 5: Custom Performance Spans

Use the useTraceKitSpan hook to measure component-level operations:

import { useTraceKitSpan } from '@tracekit/react';

function Dashboard() {
  const { startSpan } = useTraceKitSpan();

  useEffect(() => {
    const span = startSpan('load-dashboard-data');
    fetchDashboardData()
      .then((data) => {
        setData(data);
        span.end();
      })
      .catch((err) => {
        captureException(err as Error);
        span.end();
      });
  }, []);

  return <div>{/* dashboard content */}</div>;
}

Measuring route transitions:

import { useTraceKitSpan } from '@tracekit/react';
import { useLocation } from 'react-router-dom';

function RouteTracker() {
  const location = useLocation();
  const { startSpan } = useTraceKitSpan();

  useEffect(() => {
    const span = startSpan('route-transition', {
      'route.path': location.pathname,
    });
    // End span after page renders
    requestAnimationFrame(() => span.end());
  }, [location.pathname]);

  return null;
}

Step 6: Distributed Tracing

Configure tracePropagationTargets in the provider config to attach trace headers to outbound fetch/XHR requests. This connects frontend spans to backend traces.

<TraceKitProvider
  config={{
    apiKey: import.meta.env.VITE_TRACEKIT_API_KEY,
    serviceName: 'my-react-app',
    endpoint: 'https://app.tracekit.dev/v1/traces',
    enableCodeMonitoring: true,
    tracePropagationTargets: [
      'https://api.myapp.com',
      'https://auth.myapp.com',
      /^https:\/\/.*\.myapp\.com/,
    ],
  }}
>
  <App />
</TraceKitProvider>

How it works:

  1. Fetch/XHR requests to matching URLs receive a traceparent header
  2. Your backend SDK reads this header and links the backend span to the frontend trace
  3. The full request lifecycle appears as a single trace in the TraceKit dashboard

Important: Your backend CORS configuration must accept the traceparent and tracestate headers.

Step 7: Session Replay (Optional)

Enable session replay via the provider config to record user sessions for visual debugging:

import { replayIntegration } from '@tracekit/replay';

const replay = replayIntegration({
  sessionSampleRate: 0.1,
  errorSampleRate: 1.0,
  maskAllText: true,
  blockAllMedia: true,
});

<TraceKitProvider
  config={{
    apiKey: import.meta.env.VITE_TRACEKIT_API_KEY,
    serviceName: 'my-react-app',
    endpoint: 'https://app.tracekit.dev/v1/traces',
    enableCodeMonitoring: true,
    addons: [replay],
  }}
>
  <App />
</TraceKitProvider>

Step 8: Source Maps (Optional)

Upload source maps so stack traces show original file names and line numbers.

Add to your .env:

TRACEKIT_AUTH_TOKEN=your_auth_token_here

After building:

tracekit sourcemaps upload --release=1.0.0 ./build

Build integration — add to package.json:

{
  "scripts": {
    "build": "vite build",
    "postbuild": "tracekit sourcemaps upload --release=$npm_package_version ./dist"
  }
}

Ensure the release value matches the release option in your provider config.

Step 9: Verification

After integrating, verify errors and traces are flowing:

  1. Start your application with the API key env var set.
  2. Trigger a test error — add this temporarily inside a component: 
    import { captureException } from '@tracekit/react';

function TestError() {
  useEffect(() => {
    captureException(new Error('TraceKit React test error'));
  }, []);
  return null;
}
  3. Open https://app.tracekit.dev/traces.
  4. Confirm the test error and your service name appear within 30-60 seconds.
  5. Remove the test component once verified.

To test the ErrorBoundary:

function BuggyComponent() {
  throw new Error('ErrorBoundary test');
  return null;
}

// Wrap with TraceKitErrorBoundary and render — should show fallback UI
// and report error to dashboard

Complete Working Example

Full App.tsx with TraceKitProvider, ErrorBoundary, router wrapping, and all features:

// src/App.tsx
import React, { useEffect, useState } from 'react';
import { BrowserRouter, Routes, Route, Link } from 'react-router-dom';
import {
  TraceKitProvider,
  TraceKitErrorBoundary,
  useTraceKitSpan,
  captureException,
  setUser,
  setTag,
} from '@tracekit/react';
import { replayIntegration } from '@tracekit/replay';

// --- Session Replay ---
const replay = replayIntegration({
  sessionSampleRate: 0.1,
  errorSampleRate: 1.0,
  maskAllText: true,
  blockAllMedia: true,
});

// --- Error Fallback ---
function ErrorFallback({ error, resetError }: { error: Error; resetError: () => void }) {
  return (
    <div role="alert" style={{ padding: '2rem', textAlign: 'center' }}>
      <h2>Something went wrong</h2>
      <p style={{ color: '#666' }}>{error.message}</p>
      <button onClick={resetError} style={{ marginTop: '1rem', padding: '0.5rem 1rem' }}>
        Try again
      </button>
    </div>
  );
}

// --- Dashboard with performance span ---
function Dashboard() {
  const [data, setData] = useState(null);
  const { startSpan } = useTraceKitSpan();

  useEffect(() => {
    const span = startSpan('load-dashboard');
    fetch('/api/dashboard')
      .then((r) => r.json())
      .then((d) => { setData(d); span.end(); })
      .catch((err) => { captureException(err as Error); span.end(); });
  }, []);

  return <div>{data ? JSON.stringify(data) : 'Loading...'}</div>;
}

// --- App Root ---
export default function App() {
  useEffect(() => {
    // Set user context after auth
    setUser({ id: 'user-123', email: 'alice@example.com' });
    setTag('plan', 'pro');
  }, []);

  return (
    <TraceKitProvider
      config={{
        apiKey: import.meta.env.VITE_TRACEKIT_API_KEY,
        serviceName: 'my-react-app',
        release: import.meta.env.VITE_APP_VERSION || '0.0.0',
        environment: import.meta.env.MODE,
        endpoint: 'https://app.tracekit.dev/v1/traces',
        enableCodeMonitoring: true,
        tracePropagationTargets: [
          'https://api.myapp.com',
          /^https:\/\/.*\.myapp\.com/,
        ],
        addons: [replay],
      }}
    >
      <BrowserRouter>
        <nav>
          <Link to="/">Home</Link> | <Link to="/dashboard">Dashboard</Link>
        </nav>
        <TraceKitErrorBoundary
          fallback={(error, _stack, resetError) => (
            <ErrorFallback error={error} resetError={resetError} />
          )}
        >
          <Routes>
            <Route path="/" element={<h1>Home</h1>} />
            <Route path="/dashboard" element={<Dashboard />} />
          </Routes>
        </TraceKitErrorBoundary>
      </BrowserRouter>
    </TraceKitProvider>
  );
}

Troubleshooting

ErrorBoundary not catching errors

  • Event handlers: Error boundaries only catch errors during rendering. Errors in onClick, onChange, etc. must use try/catch with captureException.
  • Async code: Errors in async functions, setTimeout, or Promises are not caught by error boundaries. Use captureException in catch blocks.
  • Server components: Error boundaries do not work in React Server Components. Use error.tsx files in Next.js App Router instead.

Traces not connecting to backend

  • Check tracePropagationTargets: URLs must match your API endpoints. Verify traceparent headers appear in the browser Network tab.
  • Check CORS: Your backend must accept traceparent and tracestate in Access-Control-Allow-Headers.
  • Check backend SDK: The backend must be instrumented with a TraceKit SDK that reads traceparent.

HMR double-init in development

  • React Strict Mode: In development, Strict Mode double-renders components. The TraceKitProvider handles this gracefully by checking for existing initialization.
  • Vite HMR: If you see duplicate init warnings during hot reload, this is normal in development and does not affect production.

Source maps not resolving

  • Check release version: The release in provider config must match the --release flag during upload.
  • CRA output: Upload from ./build, not ./dist.
  • Vite output: Upload from ./dist.

Next Steps

Once your React app is traced, consider:

  • Code Monitoring — Set live breakpoints and capture snapshots in production without redeploying (already enabled via enableCodeMonitoring: true)
  • Session Replay — Visual debugging with full session recordings (see tracekit-session-replay skill)
  • Source Maps — Readable stack traces with original source code (see tracekit-source-maps skill)
  • Backend Tracing — Add @tracekit/node-apm or another backend SDK for end-to-end distributed traces (see tracekit-node-sdk, tracekit-go-sdk, and other backend skills)
  • Browser SDK — For advanced browser-level configuration, see the tracekit-browser-sdk skill

References

  • React SDK docs: https://app.tracekit.dev/docs/frontend/frameworks/react
  • TraceKit docs root: https://app.tracekit.dev/docs
  • Dashboard: https://app.tracekit.dev
  • Quick start: https://app.tracekit.dev/docs/quickstart

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