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Managed open-observability platform

Grafana Cloud

A managed Grafana platform spanning Prometheus metrics, Loki logs, Tempo traces, profiles, synthetics, application observability, and infrastructure applications.

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Editorial verdict

Choose Grafana Cloud when open-ecosystem alignment is valuable and the team can govern collectors, labels, active series, scrape frequency, host identity, and product-specific meters.12

Best for

  • Organizations already using Grafana and Prometheus conventions
  • OpenTelemetry-oriented collection
  • Teams wanting managed metrics, logs, traces, and infrastructure applications
12

Not ideal for

  • Teams wanting minimal collector and telemetry-pipeline ownership
  • Uncontrolled label cardinality or scrape frequency
  • Workloads whose current customer-cohort pricing is unclear
12
Main trade-off

Managed open-observability components and shared dashboards come with collector, label, query, telemetry-volume, and product-specific billing complexity.12

Product boundary

Whether Grafana Cloud's managed open-observability ecosystem fits the team's collection, labeling, signal, and cost responsibilities.

Grafana Cloud manages observability backends and applications; it is not self-operated Prometheus. Logs, Metrics, Synthetics, APM, and Kubernetes Monitoring have distinct collection and billing surfaces.12

For: Teams aligned with Grafana, Prometheus, Loki, Tempo, Alloy, or OpenTelemetry operating models

  • Collector and label ownership is unacceptable.
  • Active-series or DPM growth cannot be controlled.
  • Customer-cohort or host-hour pricing cannot be verified.

Why teams consider Grafana Cloud

  • Open ecosystemPrometheus, Loki, Tempo, Alloy, and OpenTelemetry patterns are central.12
  • Managed backendsGrafana Cloud operates scalable signal storage and query services.12
  • Infrastructure applicationsKubernetes and cloud-provider monitoring add guided workflows.12

Pricing

Metrics active-series/DPM, logs/traces/profiles usage, synthetic executions, and newer Kubernetes node/container hours are distinct; cohort and telemetry-credit rules must be dated.67

Metrics and logs

Grafana Cloud plan plus usage

Model active series, DPM, logs, traces, profiles, retention, and query behavior.67

Synthetics and application observability

Product-specific usage

Model API/browser executions and application-observability host or telemetry meters separately.67

Kubernetes Monitoring

Current customer cohort

Model active node/container hours and cohort-specific telemetry credits.67

Metrics unit
Active series and data points per minute67
Kubernetes unit
Active node and container hours for current cohorts67
Pricing checked View official pricing

Grafana Cloud vs alternatives

Datadog

Choose when
Choose a more vertically integrated enterprise suite.
Avoid when
Agent and multi-product pricing complexity is unacceptable.
Compared with Grafana Cloud
Proprietary suite integration replaces Grafana's open-ecosystem orientation.89

New Relic

Choose when
Choose broad observability with ingest/user or ingest/compute pricing.
Avoid when
Data ingest, retention, users, and add-ons cannot be governed.
Compared with Grafana Cloud
A different commercial and query model replaces Grafana's series and signal meters.1011

Prometheus

Choose when
Choose self-operated open-source metrics and alerting.
Avoid when
The team cannot own storage, HA, dashboards, exporters, and upgrades.
Compared with Grafana Cloud
Maximum software control replaces Grafana Cloud's managed backends and support.1213

Better Stack

Choose when
Choose a simpler integrated developer-operations suite.
Avoid when
Grafana/Prometheus ecosystem alignment is a hard requirement.
Compared with Grafana Cloud
Approachable operations integration replaces Grafana's broader open-observability stack.1415

Resources and sources

Official product, policy, and pricing

  • Grafana Cloud documentation
    Open
  • Send logs to Grafana Cloud
    Open
  • Grafana Cloud Synthetic Monitoring
    Open
  • Grafana Cloud Application Observability
    Open
  • Grafana Cloud infrastructure monitoring
    Open
  • Grafana Cloud Metrics invoice
    Open
  • Grafana Cloud Kubernetes Monitoring invoice
    Open
  1. 1
    Grafana Cloud documentation

    Grafana Labs · Accessed Official

  2. 2
    Send logs to Grafana Cloud

    Grafana Labs · Accessed Official

  3. 3
    Grafana Cloud Synthetic Monitoring

    Grafana Labs · Accessed Official

  4. 4
    Grafana Cloud Application Observability

    Grafana Labs · Accessed Official

  5. 5
    Grafana Cloud infrastructure monitoring

    Grafana Labs · Accessed Official

  6. 6
    Grafana Cloud Metrics invoice

    Grafana Labs · Accessed Official

  7. 7
    Grafana Cloud Kubernetes Monitoring invoice

    Grafana Labs · Accessed Official

  8. 8
    Datadog Host Map

    Datadog · Accessed Official

  9. 9
    Datadog pricing

    Datadog · Accessed Official

  10. 10
    New Relic infrastructure monitoring

    New Relic · Accessed Official

  11. 11
    New Relic pricing

    New Relic · Accessed Official

  12. 12
    Prometheus overview

    Prometheus · Accessed Official

  13. 13
    Prometheus storage

    Prometheus · Accessed Official

  14. 14
    Better Stack collector

    Better Stack · Accessed Official

  15. 15
    Better Stack pricing

    Better Stack · Accessed Official