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Elastic Observability vs Grafana Loki comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 9, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Elastic Observability
Ranking in Log Management
14th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (7th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (7th), Container Monitoring (4th), Cloud Monitoring Software (7th)
Grafana Loki
Ranking in Log Management
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
8.0
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of Elastic Observability is 1.7%, down from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Grafana Loki is 7.9%, up from 2.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Log Management
 

Featured Reviews

Adelina Craciun - PeerSpot reviewer
Customization enables tailored monitoring and alerting across departments
The possibility to customize it has been quite useful. Whatever the other departments want to dream up, we implement. Whatever they want to monitor, the granularity of it, the changes in the threshold, and the anomalies that they want reported all require some development. So far, every single request has been fulfilled.
CarlosPimentel - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient log filtering enhances quick network troubleshooting
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…

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The Elastic User Interface framework lets us do custom development when needed. You need to have some Javascript knowledge. We need that knowledge to develop new custom tests."
"I have built a mini business intelligence system based on Elastic Observability."
"The most valuable feature of Elastic Observability is the text search."
"The architecture and system's stability are simple."
"I recommend Elastic Observability for its completeness of vision and wide ecosystem."
"The most valued feature of Elastic is its log analytics capabilities."
"The solution allows us to dig deep into data."
"It's easy to deploy, and it's very flexible."
"Grafana Loki is easy to monitor and detect errors."
"The log collection feature is good and the solution is easily understandable. v"
"The effectiveness of filters is pivotal for optimizing the search process and extracting the specific information we need from the extensive log data."
"The most valuable features of the solution stem from the fact that it is an open-source tool that is stable and flexible."
"The most valuable part of Loki is the ability to filter logs by keywords and devices."
"The best feature of Grafana Loki is that it integrates well with our other tool."
"I appreciate the capability to process logs from microservices and seamlessly integrate them into Grafana."
"Loki significantly saves time in troubleshooting by quickly pinpointing network issues."
 

Cons

"The tool's scalability involves a more complex implementation process. It requires careful calculations to determine the number of nodes needed, the specifications of each node, and the configuration of hot, warm, and cold zones for data storage. Additionally, managing log retention policies adds further complexity. The solution's pricing also needs to be cheaper."
"Elastic Observability needs to improve the retrieval of logs and metrics from all the instances."
"Elastic APM's visualization is not that great compared to other tools. It's number of metrics is very low."
"The auto-discovery isn't nearly as good. That's a big portion of it. When you drop the agent onto the JVM and you're trying to figure things out, having to go through and manually do all that is cumbersome."
"In the future, Elastic APM needs a portfolio iTool. They can provide an easy way to develop the custom UI for Kibana."
"When opening tickets, we cannot use our team mailbox."
"There's a steep learning curve if you've never used this solution before."
"Elastic Observability is an excellent product for monitoring and visibility, but it lacks predictive analytics. Most solutions are aligned with the AIOps requirements, but this piece is missing in Elastic and should be included."
"The product must improve its UI."
"My main concern is the recommended production-grade setup. They suggest using tools like Tanka or Jsonnet. They should simplify the process to increase adoption."
"In Grafana Loki, the creation of metrics is not so easy, making it an area that could be made easier."
"We encountered certain limitations when it came to alerting, particularly when dealing with specific data sources."
"I do not see any areas for improvement at the moment."
"The correlation of requests is not simple in Grafana Loki and can be improved."
"There is a need for some change in the alerting types of the product. In short, a few changes in the alert area are needed due to minor shortcomings."
"We face some bugs when we install the latest version of Grafana Loki."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Elastic Observability's pricing could be better for small-scale users."
"The price of Elastic Observability is expensive."
"The product is not that cheap."
"Elastic Observability is cheaper than other similar solutions, such as Dynatrace. Its license calculation is based on various factors like data volume and physical infrastructure, particularly related to RAM capacity."
"We will buy a premium license after POC."
"Since we are a huge company, Elastic Observability is an affordable solution for us."
"The product’s pricing needs improvement."
"Users have to pay for some features, like the alerts on different channels, because they are unavailable in different source versions."
"The cost is less than other paid services like CloudWatch."
"You can use the free version of Grafana Loki on-premises."
"Grafana Loki is an open-source solution."
"Since we are using the open-source version of Grafana Loki, we are not paying anything for the solution."
"The solution is open source."
"Grafana Loki is a free, open-source solution."
"I use the solution's open-source version. Grafana Loki is a completely free solution for me."
"My company doesn't need to pay for the licensing cost of the solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
21%
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Elastic Observability?
Elastic Observability significantly improves incident response time by providing quick access to logs and data across various sources. For instance, searching for specific keywords in logs spanning...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Elastic Observability?
Elastic Observability is cost-efficient and provides all features in the enterprise license without asset-based licensing. However, sizing and licensing information could be clearer.
What needs improvement with Elastic Observability?
Of course, maintenance is necessary, as with any software, requiring updates with the latest features and security enhancements. It lacked some capabilities when handling on-prem devices, like netw...
What do you like most about Grafana Loki?
We are using Grafana Loki as a database for real-time metrics.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Grafana Loki?
We use the open-source version of Loki. The cloud version is competitively priced compared to other market solutions.
What needs improvement with Grafana Loki?
It would be beneficial if Loki could directly access Windows Server logs or events directly from the servers.
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

PSCU, Entel, VITAS, Mimecast, Barrett Steel, Butterfield Bank
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Elastic Observability vs. Grafana Loki and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.