Grafana Loki Reviews

Name: Grafana Loki
Brand: Grafana Labs
Rating: 4.1 (17 reviews)

4.1 out of 5

17 reviews
94% willing to recommend

What is Grafana Loki?

Grafana Loki is a powerful log aggregation and analysis tool designed for cloud-native environments. Its primary use case is to collect, store, and search logs efficiently, enabling organizations to gain valuable insights from their log data.

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Grafana Loki is the #7 ranked solution in Log Management Software. PeerSpot users give Grafana Loki an average rating of 8.2 out of 10. Grafana Loki is most commonly compared to Wazuh: Grafana Loki vs Wazuh. Grafana Loki is popular among the large enterprise segment, accounting for 54% of users researching this solution on PeerSpot. The top industry researching this solution are professionals from a computer software company, accounting for 18% of all views.

Helped 831,158 peers since 2012

Featured reviews

CarlosPimentel

Manager Director at Earth

We use Grafana Loki for various verticals including manufacturing, finance, health, and aerospatial sectors. It primarily helps in monitoring security and access to devices. Grafana dashboards are used to track access success and failure and audit commands issued on devices Loki significantly…

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Arjun Pandey

Engineering Lead- Cloud and Platform Architecture at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees

If it is HelloGuard setup or doing some setup on the dev cluster, it's pretty straightforward. But when we're dealing with a heavy cluster, like 15 to 20 terabytes of data per day, we need a production-grade cluster. For that kind of scenario, we must invest time and understand the process. We could have integrated these features within their health check, but they're using processes like Tanka and Jsonnet to implement a production service. I feel this could have been better. If I use a metric solution for metrics, I'd use Grafana for metrics monitoring. For logging, I'd use a different tool, like ELK. And for tracing another tool. So, to troubleshoot a specific issue, I have to switch between three different consoles. What I see in metrics isn't the same as in logs because the metadata and collection methods differ. That's where Loki comes in. Within Grafana, you can see metrics, logs, correlations, generate metrics from logs, and also set alerts. Alerting from logs is something many companies desire. With Loki, if there's a pattern in the log, we can filter it out without altering the entire pipeline. For instance, if I had to add fields in ELK, it would require a lot of configuration changes. Loki, however, is more flexible. It uses a grep-like pattern and the metadata model from Prometheus. It's highly efficient, with compressed data and block storage like GCS bucket or AWS S3, making log storage cost-effective. Compared to other solutions, it's more economical. Loki also has a Log CLI, which is very effective. It's all on-premises. Like, it's on the cloud, but it's self-managed, not a managed service.

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Muneeb Shoukat

DevOps Engineer at Venturenox

In the past, I have used Zabbix. In the past, I have used Zabbix, and I found Grafana Loki to be easier to use, especially in the area of GUI, which is very user-friendly. I used Kubernetes cluster to run a command and log a command. Over the other products with which I have experience, I chose Grafana Loki since it is user-friendly, offers good plug-in options, is easy to manage, and is easy to deploy. I am not interested in using Zabbix because its GUI is hard to understand.

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Grafana Loki mindshare

As of January 2025, the mindshare of Grafana Loki in the Log Management category stands at 7.0%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year, according to calculations based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Log Management

PeerAnalyst reports

Type	Title	Date
Category	Log Management	Jan 21, 2025	Download
Product	Reviews, tips, and advice from real users	Jan 21, 2025	Download
Comparison	Grafana Loki vs Splunk Enterprise Security	Jan 21, 2025	Download
Comparison	Grafana Loki vs Wazuh	Jan 21, 2025	Download
Comparison	Grafana Loki vs Datadog	Jan 21, 2025	Download

Title	Rating	Mindshare	Recommending
Wazuh	3.7	16.8%	79%	45 interviews Add to research
Dynatrace	4.4	5.5%	95%	344 interviews Add to research

Valuable Features

Grafana Loki's most valued features include simple dashboard creation, open-source stability and flexibility, effective log processing for microservices, cost-efficient storage with S3, seamless Prometheus metadata integration, robust alert setups, advanced filtering for log data analysis, user-friendly GUI, ease of deployment in multi-cluster environments, object-based storage, real-time metric management, straightforward error monitoring, lightweight processing capabilities, quick log filtering, and Kubernetes-native management.

"Loki significantly saves time in troubleshooting by quickly pinpointing network issues."
"The most valuable part of Loki is the ability to filter logs by keywords and devices."
"Grafana agent is very lightweight and does not cost significant resources of our cluster."

Room for Improvement

Grafana Loki needs better request flow visualization and request correlation. The alert creation process should be streamlined. Reports require customization to include specific metrics. Security monitoring features and query intuitiveness need enhancement. UI and dashboard versatility could improve. Issues with Docker containers and alerting limitations exist. Integrations with proprietary services like ECS are complex. Speed and stability are concerns. Access to Windows Server logs from servers would be beneficial.

"It would be beneficial if Loki could directly access Windows Server logs or events directly from the servers."
"I do not see any areas for improvement at the moment."
"It's not intended for proprietary services, so you have to struggle with configuration a lot."

ROI

Users found that setting up Grafana Loki is efficient, attributing the quick installation process as a contributing factor to immediate insights into system operations. Cost-effectiveness is emphasized with its free on-premises version and affordable cloud option, leading to positive ROI. Companies appreciated the time savings and cost reductions achieved, primarily through minimized server downtime and enhanced issue resolution. Overall, Grafana Loki enabled organizations to experience significant financial returns due to its economical and efficient nature.

Pricing

Enterprise users of Grafana Loki appreciate its open-source nature, offering a free on-premises version. Many utilize this cost-effective option without licensing fees. The cloud version is perceived as affordable and competitively priced. Pricing varies based on user count, with potential taxes. Some find the enterprise version may require licensing fees, yet consider it reasonable. Organizations are generally satisfied with the flexibility and cost-effectiveness, seeing value especially in its open-source customization capabilities.

"The cost is less than other paid services like CloudWatch."
"I find the licensing structure quite reasonable, as the free license effectively meets my requirements."
"Grafana Loki is an open-source solution."

Popular Use Cases

Companies primarily use Grafana Loki for system health monitoring, performance analysis, and log processing. It enables visualization through dashboards, integration with Slack, and monitoring of API and infrastructure. Users leverage it for analyzing logs in development and production environments, focusing on metrics like request rates and error codes. Grafana Loki efficiently manages unstructured logs and creates visual insights across sectors such as finance, manufacturing, and healthcare, enhancing security and system performance tracking.

Service and Support

Grafana Loki's customer service relies heavily on community support and online resources. Users often resolve issues through forums, GitHub, and extensive documentation. While the community is active and assists with queries, technical support from Grafana Loki is deemed lacking. Some users resort to intra-organization expertise or raise tickets when needed, with varying success. Despite this, the open-source nature allows users to address challenges independently, contributing to the community's high regard.

Deployment

Grafana Loki initial setup is generally considered easy, especially when using Docker or cloud platforms like AWS and Azure. Many find it straightforward with ample resources and documentation available. Complexity may increase with larger data clusters or integration with other tools like Prometheus. Users appreciate its flexibility, efficient log management, and cost-effectiveness. With infrastructure as code, deploying in new environments is quick, taking just minutes for replication once code is developed.

Scalability

Grafana Loki is highly regarded for its scalability, with ratings often reflecting an eight or nine out of ten. Companies report no significant issues even with hundreds of users and large server databases. Loki efficiently handles logs for extensive periods and supports multiple systems, maintaining reliability in production settings. Organizations emphasize the importance of team management and planning for scaling, underscoring its architectural effort, which allows it to scale effectively.

Stability

Grafana Loki exhibits generally strong stability, with some users noting flawless performance and high ratings. However, a few users mention occasional issues like challenges with outdated systems and log retrieval problems. Stability ratings vary, with some users scoring it as perfect, while others cite difficulties, rating it lower. Many users experience solid operation, especially appreciating the capability to handle large data volumes, which highlights its dependability in different environments.

These insights are based on the in-depth reviews provided by peers to help you make a better buying decision.

Download our Grafana Loki Buyer's Guide for additional reliable information.

Review data by company size

By reviewers

By visitors reading reviews

Top industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

18%

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

University

Government

Retailer

Media Company

Energy/Utilities Company

Healthcare Company

Insurance Company

Hospitality Company

Non Profit

Outsourcing Company

Real Estate/Law Firm

Wholesaler/Distributor

Construction Company

Transportation Company

Legal Firm

Recreational Facilities/Services Company

Marketing Services Firm

Pharma/Biotech Company

Consumer Goods Company

Performing Arts

Leisure / Travel Company

Compare Grafana Loki with alternative products

Learn more about Grafana Loki

The most valuable functionality of Loki is its ability to scale horizontally, making it suitable for high-volume log data. It achieves this by utilizing a unique indexing approach called "Promtail," which efficiently indexes logs and allows for fast searching and filtering. Loki also supports log streaming in real-time, ensuring that organizations can monitor and analyze logs as they are generated.

By centralizing logs in a single location, Loki simplifies log management and troubleshooting processes. It provides a unified view of logs from various sources, making it easier to identify and resolve issues quickly. With its powerful query language, organizations can extract meaningful information from logs, enabling them to gain insights into system performance, identify anomalies, and detect potential security threats.

Loki's integration with Grafana, a popular open-source visualization tool, allows users to create rich dashboards and visualizations based on log data. This combination enhances the observability of systems and applications, enabling organizations to make data-driven decisions and improve overall operational efficiency.