#Using the Instrumentation CR with Service Mesh

When you use the Instrumentation custom resource (CR) with a service mesh, the required propagator depends on the tracing protocol configured in Istio.

Istio leverages Envoy's distributed tracing capabilities to provide tracing integration out of the box. Most tracing backends now accept the OpenTelemetry protocol to receive traces, although Istio also supports legacy tracing protocols such as Zipkin.

#Istio Using the OpenTelemetry Protocol

If Istio is configured to export traces by using the OpenTelemetry protocol, no additional propagator changes are required in the Instrumentation CR. The default propagator settings continue to work as expected.

#Istio Using the Zipkin Protocol

If Istio is configured to export traces by using the Zipkin protocol, you must configure the b3multi propagator in the Instrumentation resource so that trace context is propagated correctly across the mesh.

apiVersion: opentelemetry.io/v1alpha1
kind: Instrumentation
metadata:
  name: my-instrumentation
spec:
  ...
  propagators:
    - tracecontext
    - baggage
    - b3multi