serverless-newrelic-lambda-layers

serverless-newrelic-lambda-layers

A Serverless plugin to add New Relic observability using AWS Lambda Layers without requiring a code change.

Requirements

• serverless v3.x & v4.x (This plugin has been tested to work with Serverless Framework v3 & v4)
• Node >= 16.x (if using Serverless version 3)

Features

• Installs and configures the New Relic AWS Integration
• Supports Node.js, Python, Java, Ruby, Dotnet runtimes
• No code change required to enable New Relic
• Bundles New Relic's agent in a single layer
• Configures CloudWatch subscription filters automatically

Install

With NPM:

npm install --save-dev serverless-newrelic-lambda-layers

(Note: this plugin's production dependencies are now defined as peer dependencies. NPM v7 and later will install missing peer dependencies automatically, but v6 does not.)

With yarn:

yarn add --dev serverless-newrelic-lambda-layers

Add the plugin to your serverless.yml:

plugins:
  - serverless-newrelic-lambda-layers

This plugin should come last in your plugin ordering, particularly if you're also using plugins such as serverless-plugin-typescript or serverless-webpack.

If you don't yet have a New Relic account, sign up here.

Grab your New Relic Account ID, your New Relic Personal API Key and plug them into your serverless.yml:

custom:
  newRelic:
    accountId: your-new-relic-account-id-here
    apiKey: your-new-relic-personal-api-key-here

or

custom:
  newRelic:
    accountId: your-new-relic-account-id-here
    ingestKey: your-new-relic-ingest-key-here

Deploy:

sls deploy

And you're all set.

Usage

This plugin wraps your handlers without requiring a code change. If you're currently using a New Relic agent, you can remove the wrapping code you currently have and this plugin will do it for you automatically.

• Node.js Instrumentation Guide
• Python Instrumentation Guide
• Java Instrumentation Guide
• Ruby Instrumentation Guide
• Dotnet Instrumentation Guide

Follow the instructions in the guide to implement instrumentation with the Serverless Framework

Config

The following config options are available via the newRelic section of the custom section of your serverless.yml:

accountId (required)

Your New Relic Account ID.

custom:
  newRelic:
    accountId: your-account-id-here

apiKey (required)

Your New Relic Personal API Key.

custom:
  newRelic:
    apiKey: your-api-key-here

If your function's source is committed to version control, you can avoid committing your license key by including it in your serverless.yml as a variable. See the Serverless docs on template variables for more information.

ingestKey (required)

Your New Relic Personal API Key.

custom:
  newRelic:
    ingestKey: your-ingest-key-here

nrRegion (required for EU; optional for US)

If your New Relic account is based in the EU, make sure to specify your nrRegion in the custom block:

custom:
  newRelic:
    nrRegion: 'eu'

linkedAccount (optional)

A label for the New Relic Linked Account. This is how this integration will appear in New Relic. If not set, it will default to "New Relic Lambda Integration - ".

custom:
  newRelic:
    linkedAccount: your-linked-account-name

trustedAccountKey (optional)

Only required if your New Relic account is a sub-account. This needs to be the account ID for the root/parent account.

custom:
  newRelic:
    trustedAccountKey: your-parent-account-id

debug (optional)

Whether or not to enable debug mode. Must be a boolean value. This sets the log level to debug.

custom:
  newRelic:
    debug: true

enableExtension (optional)

Allows your function to deliver its telemetry to New Relic via AWS Lambda Extension. Defaults to true, so it can be omitted. To avoid delivering your telemetry via the extension, set to false.

custom:
  newRelic:
    enableExtension: true

sendFunctionLogs (optional)

Allows your function to deliver all of your function logs to New Relic via AWS Lambda Extension. The sendFunctionLogs config works identically to the older enableFunctionLogs. This new config has been introduced for consistency with sendExtensionLogs. While the new naming provides improved clarity, enableFunctionLogs remains available to ensure backward compatibility.

custom:
  newRelic:
    sendFunctionLogs: true

sendExtensionLogs (optional)

Allows your function to deliver all of your extension logs to New Relic via AWS Lambda Extension.

custom:
  newRelic:
    sendExtensionLogs: true

sendPlatformLogs (optional)

Allows your function to deliver all of your platform logs to New Relic via AWS Lambda Extension.

custom:
  newRelic:
    sendPlatformLogs: true

enableFunctionLogs (optional)

Allows your function to deliver all of your function logs to New Relic via AWS Lambda Extension. This would eliminate the need for a CloudWatch log subscription + the NR log ingestion Lambda function. This method of log ingestion is lower-cost, and offers faster time to glass.

custom:
  newRelic:
    enableFunctionLogs: true

enableExtensionLogs (optional)

The New Relic Lambda Extension writes diagnostic logs by default. If you'd prefer to mute them, set this to false. (Defaults to true.)

custom:
  newRelic:
    enableExtensionLogs: false

nrTags (optional)

Specify tags to be added to all log events. Optional. Each tag is composed of a colon-delimited key and value. Multiple key-value pairs are semicolon-delimited; for example, env:prod;team:myTeam.

custom:
  newRelic:
    nrTags:'env:prod;team:myTeam'

nrEnvDelimiter (optional)

Some users in UTF-8 environments might face difficulty in defining strings of NR_TAGS delimited by the semicolon ; character. Use NR_ENV_DELIMITER, to set custom delimiter for NR_TAGS.

custom:
  newRelic:
    nrEnvDelimiter:','

logEnabled (optional)

Enables logging when using CloudWatch-based telemetry transport with the newrelic-log-ingestion Lambda function. Defaults to false

enableIntegration (optional)

Allows the creation of New Relic aws cloud integration when absent. Defaults to false. If an integration already exists for your AWS account,you can omit this.

custom:
  newRelic:
    enableIntegration: true

logLevel (optional)

Sets a log level on all functions. Possible values: 'fatal', 'error', 'warn', 'info', 'debug', 'trace' or 'silent'. Defaults to 'error'

You can still override log level on a per function basis by configuring environment variable NEW_RELIC_LOG_LEVEL.

custom:
  newRelic:
    logLevel: debug

Logging configuration is considered in the following order:

• function NEW_RELIC_LOG_LEVEL environment
• provider NEW_RELIC_LOG_LEVEL environment
• custom newRelic logLevel property
• custom newRelic debug flag

manualWrapping (optional)

Functions with many dependencies may experience longer cold start times with dynamic wrapping. One possible remediation is to wrap the function manually, and bypass the no-code-change wrapping. If you enable this option, you'll need to require (or, for ESM, import) the New Relic Node Agent, and wrap the body of your handler function. You would still be able to take advantage of the easy installation of the agent via Lambda Layers, and still have telemetry transported to New Relic via the Lambda Extension. We recommend that you include the New Relic Node Agent as a devDependency for local development, and omit it from the dependencies you deploy. Defaults to false.

custom:
  newRelic:
    manualWrapping: true

customRolePolicy (optional)

Specify an alternative IAM role policy ARN for this integration here if you do not want to use the default role policy.

custom:
  newRelic:
    customRolePolicy: your-custom-role-policy-arn

stages (optional)

An array of stages that the plugin will be included for. If this key is not specified then all stages will be included.

custom:
  newRelic:
    stages:
       - prod

include (optional)

An array of functions to include for automatic wrapping. (You can set include or exclude options, but not both.)

custom:
  newRelic:
    include:
      - include-only-func
      - another-included-func

exclude (optional)

An array of functions to exclude from automatic wrapping. (You can set include or exclude options, but not both.)

custom:
  newRelic:
    exclude:
      - excluded-func-1
      - another-excluded-func

layerArn (optional)

Pin to a specific layer version. The latest layer ARN is automatically fetched from the New Relic Layers API

custom:
  newRelic:
    layerArn: arn:aws:lambda:us-east-1:451483290750:layer:NewRelicPython37:2

slim (optional)

slim adds Node.js layer without OpenTelemetry dependencies, resulting in a lighter size.

custom:
  newRelic:
    slim: true

cloudWatchFilter (optional)

Provide a list of quoted filter terms for the CloudWatch log subscription to the newrelic-log-ingestion Lambda. Combines all terms into an OR filter. Defaults to "NR_LAMBDA_MONITORING" if not set. Use "*" to capture all logs

custom:
  newRelic:
    cloudWatchFilter:
      - "NR_LAMBDA_MONITORING"
      - "trace this"
      - "ERROR"

If you want to collect all logs:

custom:
  newRelic:
    cloudWatchFilter: "*"

Be sure to set the LOGGING_ENABLED environment variable to true in your log ingestion function. See the aws-log-ingestion documentation for details.

prepend (optional)

Whether or not to prepend the New Relic layer. Defaults to false which appends the layer.

custom:
  newRelic:
    prepend: true

logIngestionFunctionName (optional)

Only required if your New Relic log ingestion function name is different from newrelic-log-ingestion.

custom:
  newRelic:
    logIngestionFunctionName: log-ingestion-service

disableAutoSubscription (optional)

Only required if you want to disable auto subscription.

custom:
  newRelic:
    disableAutoSubscription: true

disableLicenseKeySecret (optional)

Only required if you want to disable creating license key in AWS Secrets Manager. Setting this as true would create NEW_RELIC_LICENSE_KEY environment variable for the New Relic Lambda Extension to access.

custom:
  newRelic:
    disableLicenseKeySecret: true

enableDistributedTracing (optional)

Only required if you want to disable distributed tracing.

custom:
  newRelic:
     enableDistributedTracing: false

javaNewRelicHandler (optional)

Java runtimes only. Only required if you are implementing the RequestStreamHandler interface. Defaults to RequestHandler interface.

Accepted inputs:

• handleRequest
• handleStreamsRequest

custom:
  newRelic:
    javaNewRelicHandler: handleStreamsRequest

proxy (optional)

This plugin makes various HTTP requests to public APIs in order to retrieve data about the New Relic and cloud provider accounts. If you are behind a proxy when this plugin runs, the HTTP agent needs the proxy information to connect to those APIs. Use the given URL as a proxy for HTTP requests.

custom:
  newRelic:
    proxy: http://yourproxy.com:8080

APM + Serverless Convergence

APM + Serverless Convergence enables you to upgrade existing Lambda functions or instrument new functions to monitor them in the New Relic APM interface with minimal effort.

apm

Enable APM Lambda Fusion Mode

custom:
  newRelic:
    apm: true

Provider Tags

Add NR.Apm.Lambda.Mode tag

provider:
  tags:
    NR.Apm.Lambda.Mode: true

Supported Runtimes

This plugin currently supports the following AWS runtimes:

Runtime	Versions
Python	python3.8, python3.9, python3.10, python3.11, python3.12, python3.13 , python3.14
Node.js	nodejs16.x, nodejs18.x, nodejs20.x, nodejs22.x , nodejs24.x
.NET	dotnet3.1, dotnet6, dotnet8, dotnet10
Java	java8.al2, java11, java17, java21
Provided	provided.al2, provided.al2023
Ruby	ruby3.2, ruby3.3, ruby3.4

Contributing

Testing

• Make changes to examples/nodejs/serverless.yml based on what you are planning to test
• Generate a test case by executing script generate:test:case

# Example
npm run generate:test:case

• Rename generated file tests/fixtures/example.service.input.json to test case e.g. tests/fixtures/log-level.service.input.json
• Create expected output file tests/fixtures/example.service.output.json for test case e.g. tests/fixtures/log-level.service.output.json
• Run tests

# Example
npm run test