Techniques are disclosed for identifying a minimal operator subsets in a distributed streams application for debugging purposes. A debugging tool receives a selection of operators from a plurality of operators included in a distributed application. The distributed application executes the plurality of operators in a runtime environment. The debugging tool identifies, based on the selected operators, a subset of the plurality of operators to execute in a debugging environment. The subset includes at least the selected operators. The debugging tool executes the subset of the plurality of operators in the debugging environment.