---
title: "Getting Started Tutorial"
description: "Follow this step-by-step tutorial to set up Sentry error monitoring and distributed tracing for a sample fullstack JavaScript app. You'll learn howto trace errors from your frontend through to your backend, see readable stack traces, and pinpoint the commit that caused them."
url: https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/
---

# Getting Started Tutorial

By the end of this tutorial, you'll be able to:

* See errors as they happen in both apps and get notified about them.
* Follow a single error across the network boundary from frontend to backend in one distributed trace.
* Read un-minified stack traces that point to the exact line of source code that caused an error.

##### Time to complete

This tutorial takes about **45 minutes**. Steps 1–4 set up distributed tracing across your stack (roughly 30 minutes). Step 5 is optional and builds on that foundation.

## [What You'll Build](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial.md#what-youll-build)

You'll start with two sample apps — one frontend, one backend — and instrument the Sentry SDK into each. You'll then trigger an error from the UI that fails on the backend, and watch Sentry stitch both halves of the failure into a single distributed trace.

This tutorial uses a [sample React app](https://github.com/getsentry/tracing-tutorial-frontend) on the frontend and a [sample Express API](https://github.com/getsentry/tracing-tutorial-backend) on the backend. Some familiarity with JavaScript will help you follow along. You can also apply the same steps to your own project, as long as you're running React on the frontend and Express on the backend.

## [Prerequisites](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial.md#prerequisites)

* A [Sentry](https://sentry.io) account — [sign up](https://sentry.io/signup/) if you don't have one
* A [GitHub](https://github.com/) account — [sign up](https://github.com/join) if you don't have one
* [Node 18+](https://nodejs.org/en/download/)

## [Tutorial Steps](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial.md#tutorial-steps)

1. [Create Frontend and Backend Sentry Projects](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/create-new-project.md)
2. [Add the Sentry SDK to Your Frontend Project](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/initialize-sentry-sdk-frontend.md)
3. [Add the Sentry SDK to Your Backend Project](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/initialize-sentry-sdk-backend.md)
4. [Capture Your First Distributed Tracing Error](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/generate-first-error.md)
5. [Enable Readable Stack Traces](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/enable-readable-stack-traces.md) *(optional)*

## [Next](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial.md#next)

[Create your Sentry projects](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/create-new-project.md)

## Pages in this section

- [Create Frontend and Backend Sentry Projects](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/create-new-project.md)
- [Add the Sentry SDK to Your Frontend Project](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/initialize-sentry-sdk-frontend.md)
- [Add the Sentry SDK to Your Backend Project](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/initialize-sentry-sdk-backend.md)
- [Capture Your First Distributed Tracing Error](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/generate-first-error.md)
- [Enable Readable Stack Traces](https://docs.sentry.io/product/sentry-basics/getting-started-tutorial/enable-readable-stack-traces.md)