Grafana Review
Open-source dashboards and observability, backed by usage-based Grafana Cloud
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Looking for a Grafana alternative? See our ranked comparison.→What is Grafana?
Grafana is the dashboarding layer most teams already know, now sold as a full observability platform (the LGTM stack: Loki for logs, Grafana for visualization, Tempo for traces, Mimir for metrics) plus Grafana Cloud, a hosted version with usage-based billing.
You can self-host the open-source core for free and pay nothing but your own infrastructure, or run on Grafana Cloud and get billed per GB of logs, per thousand metric series, per trace volume, and per active user, each metered separately.
Most teams end up on some mix: self-hosted Grafana for visualization on top of their own Prometheus/Loki, or fully on Grafana Cloud to skip running that infrastructure themselves.
Grafana screenshots
Who it's for
- ✓ Teams that already run Prometheus, Loki, or Tempo and just want a dashboard layer on top
- ✓ Teams that want the option to self-host and avoid vendor lock-in on the visualization layer
- ✓ Platform teams comfortable tuning cardinality and retention to control cost
Who should look elsewhere
- ✗ Teams that want one flat bill instead of tracking seven separate usage meters
- ✗ Small teams without someone who can own Prometheus/cardinality management
Pros
- + Real free forever tier: 10k metric series and 50 GB each of logs, traces, and profiles per month, no credit card
- + Self-hosting the open-source core is a genuine option, not just a marketing claim, so you're never fully locked into the cloud bill
- + Volume discounts kick in automatically as usage grows, and Adaptive Metrics/Adaptive Logs can cut ingested volume automatically
- + Wide data source support, including many non-Grafana Cloud backends
Cons
- – Metrics pricing is driven by cardinality, not raw data volume, so adding labels or a second Kubernetes cluster can multiply your series count and your bill far faster than you'd expect
- – Costs are metered across seven or more independent dimensions (metrics, logs, traces, profiles, k6, synthetics, hosts), each with its own rate, which makes the bill hard to forecast
- – Log and trace ingestion is billed whether or not anyone ever queries that data
Grafana pricing
At about $19/month to start, it sits mid-pack on price in Observability & Error Monitoring.
| Plan | Price | Highlights |
|---|---|---|
| Free | Free | 10k active metric series · 50 GB logs, 50 GB traces, 50 GB profiles ingested per month · 14-day retention · 3 active Grafana users · 500 k6 virtual user hours |
| Pro | $19/mo | $19/month platform fee plus usage · Metrics $6.50 per 1k series after 10k included · Logs and traces $0.05/GB process, $0.40/GB write, $0.10/GB retain after free allowance · 30-day log and trace retention, 13-month metrics retention · 8x5 email support |
| Enterprise | Custom | From $25,000/year minimum commitment · Lower per-unit rates (metrics as low as $3/1k series) · Custom retention, premium support, choice of Public Cloud, Federal Cloud, or Bring Your Own Cloud deployment |
Grafana Cloud bills separately across metrics, logs, traces, profiles, k6 load testing, synthetics, Kubernetes monitoring, and more, each with its own per-unit rate. The $19/month figure is the Pro plan's flat platform fee, not a full seat price; your actual bill depends on ingest volume and active users. Enterprise pricing is quote-only, starting around $25,000/year. Figures pulled from the live pricing page.
Pricing verified July 7, 2026 · source
How Grafana's pricing compares
Grafana next to its closest alternatives on entry price, billing, and whether pricing is public.
| Tool | Starting price | Billing | Free option | Pricing disclosed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grafana | $19/mo | usage-based | Yes | Partly public |
| Sentry | $26/mo | usage-based | Yes | Partly public |
| Datadog | $15/host/mo | usage-based | Yes | Partly public |
| New Relic | $10/seat/mo | tiered | Yes | Partly public |
| Honeycomb | $150/mo | usage-based | Yes | Partly public |
| Axiom | $25/mo | usage-based | Yes | Partly public |
Is Grafana still actively developed?
Last significant update: June 2026. Grafana 13.1 extends Git Sync for observability-as-code, adds Grafana Assistant support for 8 more data sources including Snowflake and Dynatrace, and reworks the query editor and dashboard variables.
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Grafana FAQ
Is Grafana actually free?+
Yes, the open-source core is free to self-host, and Grafana Cloud has a permanent free tier: 10k metric series, 50 GB each of logs, traces, and profiles per month, and 3 active users, no credit card required.
Why do Grafana Cloud bills spike unexpectedly?+
Metrics pricing is driven by cardinality, the number of unique label combinations, not data volume. A single 50-pod Kubernetes cluster can generate over 100,000 series from default Prometheus exporters, roughly $650/month on Pro pricing before any custom metrics or staging environments are added. Teams commonly report their actual bill landing two to five times over their first estimate.
Can I avoid Grafana Cloud's usage-based billing entirely?+
Yes. You can self-host the open-source Grafana, Loki, Tempo, and Mimir stack yourself and pay only your own infrastructure costs, though you then own the operational work Grafana Cloud otherwise handles.
How much does Grafana Cloud Enterprise cost?+
Enterprise pricing is quote-only and starts around $25,000 a year as a minimum commitment, with per-unit rates lower than Pro (for example metrics as low as $3 per 1,000 series).