Prometheus vs Grafana Cloud: Comparison for Monitoring
Compare Prometheus and Grafana Cloud on metrics, visualisation, and managed service. Discover which monitoring platform best fits your AI infrastructure.
Prometheus
Open-source metrics database and monitoring system. Prometheus scrapes metrics, stores time-series data, and offers PromQL for queries. The standard for Kubernetes and cloud-native monitoring. Self-host or via managed services.
Grafana Cloud
Grafana's managed observability platform with Prometheus-compatible metrics, Loki for logs, and Tempo for traces. Grafana Cloud combines storage, visualisation, and alerting. Prometheus is often the metrics backend.
Comparison table
| Feature | Prometheus | Grafana Cloud |
|---|---|---|
| Focus | Metrics — time-series database | Full observability — metrics, logs, traces |
| Model | Open-source, self-host or managed | Managed SaaS |
| Visualisation | Limited — Grafana recommended | Grafana dashboards native |
| Logs/Traces | No — metrics only | Loki (logs), Tempo (traces) |
| PromQL | Native | Prometheus-compatible |
| Pricing | Free (self-host), managed varies | Free tier, usage-based |
Verdict
Prometheus is the metrics standard. Grafana Cloud is a managed layer on top. They complement each other — Prometheus for metrics, Grafana for dashboards. Grafana Cloud bundles everything. For self-host: Prometheus. For managed: Grafana Cloud.
Our recommendation
AVARC Solutions uses Grafana Cloud for most client projects — metrics, logs, and traces in one platform. For clients with existing Prometheus stacks we keep Prometheus and add Grafana for visualisation.
Frequently asked questions
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