Grafana visualises metrics from dozens of sources, from Prometheus and PostgreSQL to cloud monitoring APIs, on one dashboard. It is the standard for infrastructure monitoring because alerting, annotations, and templated dashboards work the way operators expect. It is open source and can be self-hosted.
Who it is for
An SRE team that needs one dashboard over metrics already sitting in Prometheus and a managed database.
Key features
- Connects Prometheus, Postgres, and cloud APIs
- Alerting with contact points and silences
- Templated dashboards with variables
- Self-hosted or Grafana Cloud
- SSO and RBAC on paid tiers
- Plugin catalog for data sources and panels
Where it falls short
It visualises data, it does not store it, so you still need a time-series database, and configuration for complex alerting is verbose.
Pricing
Open source is free to self-host with no user limits; Cloud has a free tier with capped metrics and users, and SSO plus long retention are the paid gates.
Prices move; the tier structure is the part that stays true. Check current pricing on Grafana.
Alternatives to Grafana
Frequently asked
Is Grafana free?
Partly. Open source is free to self-host with no user limits; Cloud has a free tier with capped metrics and users, and SSO plus long retention are the paid gates.
What is Grafana best for?
An SRE team that needs one dashboard over metrics already sitting in Prometheus and a managed database.
What are the best alternatives to Grafana?
The closest substitutes we list are Metabase, PostHog and Looker Studio. They sit in a similar price bracket but make a different trade-off, so read the weaknesses section of each review before switching.
Which platforms does Grafana run on?
Grafana is available on Web and Docker.