What is Grafana?

Grafana is an open-source platform that transforms raw metrics from databases, cloud services, and applications into interactive dashboards and visualizations. It doesn't store data itself—instead, it connects to wherever your data already lives and displays it in ways that actually make sense.

The platform has become a standard tool in DevOps and IT operations, but its flexibility extends to business intelligence, IoT monitoring, and anywhere else time-series data matters. This guide covers how Grafana works, what data sources it supports, and how organizations use it to monitor everything from server health to sales performance.

What is Grafana

Grafana is an open-source analytics and interactive visualization platform that lets you query, visualize, and set alerts on metrics from multiple data sources. Developed by Grafana Labs, it has become one of the go-to tools for monitoring infrastructure, applications, and business data. Think of it as a window into your systems—one that transforms raw numbers into charts, graphs, and dashboards you can actually understand.

What makes Grafana different from other tools is that it doesn't store your data. Instead, it connects to wherever your data already lives and pulls it together into a single view. So if you have metrics in Prometheus, logs in Elasticsearch, and business data in PostgreSQL, Grafana can display all of it on one dashboard.

• Open-source platform: Grafana is free to use under the AGPL license, though paid enterprise options exist
• Data visualization: The platform offers charts, graphs, gauges, heatmaps, and dozens of other ways to represent your metrics
• Multi-source querying: You can combine data from completely different databases without moving or copying anything

History of Grafana and Grafana Labs

Grafana started in 2014 when Torkel Ödegaard forked Kibana to create something better suited for time-series databases like Graphite and InfluxDB. What began as a side project quickly gained traction in the DevOps community.

Grafana Labs, the company behind the platform, has since grown into a major player in the observability space. The company maintains the open-source project while also offering Grafana Cloud and enterprise solutions for organizations that want managed hosting or additional features.

Key Features of Grafana

The platform's popularity comes down to flexibility and power. DevOps teams, site reliability engineers, and data analysts all find something useful here, which explains why Grafana appears in so many different tech stacks.

Data Visualization and Grafana Dashboards

A Grafana dashboard is essentially a collection of panels, where each panel displays data through a specific visualization type. You might have a line graph showing CPU usage over time, a gauge displaying current memory consumption, and a table listing recent errors—all on the same screen.

Dashboards are highly customizable. You can drag panels around, resize them, set time ranges, and create variables that let viewers filter data dynamically. Once you've built something useful, you can share it with your team or export it as a JSON file to use elsewhere.

Multi-Source Data Querying

Here's where Grafana really shines. Most visualization tools lock you into a single database, but Grafana connects to over 150 different data sources. You can display Prometheus metrics next to PostgreSQL data next to Elasticsearch logs—all on the same dashboard, all updating in real time.

This approach means your data stays where it is. No migration, no duplication, no extra storage costs.

Alerting and Notifications

Grafana includes a built-in alerting system that watches your metrics and notifies you when something goes wrong. You define thresholds—say, CPU usage above 90% for more than five minutes—and Grafana sends alerts through your preferred channels.

Notification options include email, Slack, PagerDuty, Microsoft Teams, and many others. Teams can respond to issues before users even notice a problem.

Grafana Tracing Capabilities

Distributed tracing follows a single request as it moves through your system, hopping from service to service. This is particularly useful in microservices architectures where a slow response might involve dozens of different components.

Grafana integrates with tracing backends like Jaeger and Tempo, letting you visualize traces alongside your metrics and logs. When something breaks, you can see exactly where the request got stuck.

AI-Powered Analytics and Insights

Recent versions have introduced machine learning features for anomaly detection and forecasting. While Grafana isn't primarily an AI tool, these additions help surface unusual patterns that might otherwise go unnoticed.

How Grafana Dashboards Work

Building a dashboard follows a predictable workflow. First, you connect your data sources through the settings menu. Then you create panels, each with its own query written in whatever language your database uses—PromQL for Prometheus, SQL for PostgreSQL, and so on.

• Connect data source: Configure the connection to your database, including authentication and endpoint details
• Build queries: Write queries in your data source's native language to pull the specific metrics you want
• Create panels: Choose a visualization type and customize colors, legends, thresholds, and labels
• Organize dashboard: Arrange panels into logical groups, add rows for organization, and set default time ranges

The learning curve depends largely on how comfortable you are with your underlying data sources. If you already know PromQL, building Prometheus dashboards feels natural.

Data Sources Grafana Supports

Grafana acts as a visualization layer that sits on top of your existing databases. It doesn't care where your data comes from, as long as there's a plugin to connect to it.

Prometheus Integration

Prometheus is a time-series database designed for monitoring and alerting. It collects metrics from your systems and stores them with timestamps, making it perfect for tracking things like CPU usage, request counts, and error rates over time.

The Prometheus-Grafana combination has become something of a standard in cloud-native environments. Prometheus handles collection and storage while Grafana handles visualization.

InfluxDB and Grafana

InfluxDB is another time-series database, often used for IoT applications and sensor data. Grafana's native support makes it straightforward to build dashboards for these use cases.

Elasticsearch Integration

For log data and search analytics, Elasticsearch integration lets you visualize log patterns, search results, and aggregations. Security teams often use this combination for monitoring and threat detection.

PostgreSQL and MySQL

Traditional relational databases work too. You can query sales figures, customer data, or any other information stored in PostgreSQL or MySQL and display it alongside your technical metrics.

Cloud Provider Integrations

AWS CloudWatch, Azure Monitor, and Google Cloud Monitoring all have native integrations. If you're running infrastructure in the cloud, you can pull those metrics directly into Grafana without setting up additional collectors.

Common Use Cases for Grafana

Grafana appears in surprisingly diverse contexts. The same platform that monitors Kubernetes clusters also powers sales dashboards and IoT sensor displays.

Infrastructure Monitoring and Observability

The most common use case involves monitoring servers, containers, and network infrastructure. Dashboards typically show CPU usage, memory consumption, disk I/O, network traffic, and container health.

Application Performance Monitoring

Tracking response times, error rates, and throughput helps teams understand how applications behave under load. Grafana dashboards can correlate application metrics with infrastructure data to pinpoint root causes.

Log Analysis and Management

When paired with Loki—Grafana's log aggregation system—teams can search and analyze logs alongside metrics. Having everything in one place simplifies troubleshooting considerably.

Business Intelligence and Reporting

Beyond technical monitoring, organizations use Grafana for sales dashboards, operational reporting, and executive summaries. The visualization capabilities work just as well for business data.

IoT and Sensor Data Visualization

Time-series data from IoT devices fits naturally into Grafana's model. Manufacturing plants, agricultural operations, and smart buildings all benefit from real-time sensor dashboards.

Grafana vs Prometheus

People often ask whether to use Grafana or Prometheus, but the question misses the point. These tools do different things and work best together.

Aspect	Grafana	Prometheus
Primary function	Visualization	Data collection and storage
Data storage	No native storage	Time-series database
Querying	Multiple sources	PromQL only
Alerting	Yes	Yes

Prometheus collects and stores your metrics. Grafana displays them. Most teams use both.

Grafana vs Splunk

Splunk is an enterprise platform focused on log management and security analytics. The comparison with Grafana usually comes down to cost, complexity, and use case.

Aspect	Grafana	Splunk
Licensing	Open-source option	Proprietary
Primary strength	Visualization	Log management
Cost	Free tier available	Enterprise pricing
Learning curve	Moderate	Steeper

Grafana offers a more accessible starting point, especially for teams already comfortable with open-source tools. Splunk provides deeper log analysis capabilities but at a higher price point.

Is Grafana an AI Tool

Not really. Grafana is fundamentally a visualization and observability platform. However, Grafana Labs has been adding machine learning features for anomaly detection, forecasting, and intelligent alerting.

These AI-assisted capabilities enhance the core product rather than defining it. You might think of them as smart additions to a tool that's primarily about displaying data clearly.

Getting Started with Grafana

Several paths exist depending on your preferences and technical comfort level.

Self-Hosted Installation Options

Grafana runs on Linux, Windows, and macOS. Docker images are available for containerized deployments. Self-hosting gives you complete control but means you're responsible for updates and maintenance.

Grafana Cloud Setup

For those who prefer managed hosting, Grafana Cloud offers a free tier with generous limits. This option eliminates infrastructure management and keeps you on the latest version automatically.

Creating Your First Prometheus Dashboard

A typical starting point involves connecting Prometheus as a data source and building a basic dashboard with CPU and memory panels. The official documentation includes step-by-step tutorials for this common scenario.

Grafana Pricing and Licensing

Understanding the cost structure helps with planning, especially for larger deployments.

Open Source Edition

The open-source edition is completely free and includes all core visualization and alerting features. You host it yourself and manage your own infrastructure.

Grafana Cloud Tiers

Grafana Cloud offers a free tier suitable for small teams and personal projects. Paid tiers add more users, longer data retention, and additional features like advanced alerting.

Enterprise Features and Support

Enterprise subscriptions include enhanced security features, premium plugins, and dedicated support. Larger organizations often choose this option for compliance requirements and guaranteed response times.

Why Data Visualization and Monitoring Drive Organizational Success

Effective data visualization turns raw numbers into patterns you can act on. Whether you're monitoring server health or tracking employee engagement, seeing the data clearly leads to better decisions.

Organizations that invest in observability often see faster incident response and improved reliability. The same principle applies to talent management—platforms like Engagedly use analytics and visualization to help HR teams spot performance trends and engagement patterns before they become problems.

Book a demo to see how data-driven insights can transform your approach to talent management.

FAQs about Grafana

What programming language is Grafana written in?

Grafana's backend uses Go, while the frontend is built with TypeScript and React.

Can Grafana be used without Prometheus?

Yes. Grafana works with over 150 data sources, so Prometheus is just one option among many.

How secure is Grafana for enterprise deployment?

Grafana supports LDAP, OAuth, and SAML authentication, along with role-based access control and audit logging for enterprise security requirements.

What is the difference between Grafana and Kibana?

Kibana is tightly coupled with Elasticsearch, while Grafana connects to many different data sources. Grafana offers more flexibility for organizations using diverse databases.

Does Grafana support real-time data streaming?

Yes. Dashboards can update automatically with configurable refresh intervals, and Grafana supports live streaming for data sources that offer it.