Grafana vs ServiceNow Cloud Observability comparison

Grafana Labs and ServiceNow are both solutions in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category. Grafana Labs is ranked #7 with an average rating of 7.9, while ServiceNow is ranked #64. Grafana Labs holds a 2.6% mindshare in APM, compared to ServiceNow’s 0.7% mindshare. Additionally, 88% of Grafana Labs users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of ServiceNow users who would recommend it.

Grafana

Read 50 Grafana reviews

14,292 Views
13,434 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

ServiceNow Cloud Observability

Read 5 ServiceNow Cloud Observability reviews

2,183 Views
2,096 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Grafana

ServiceNow Cloud Observability

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 2024

Grafana and ServiceNow Cloud Observability are two leading products for cloud monitoring and analytics. Grafana appears to have the upper hand in cost-effectiveness and support, while ServiceNow Cloud Observability excels in advanced features.

Features: Grafana offers customizable dashboards, extensive plugin availability, and flexibility. ServiceNow Cloud Observability provides comprehensive monitoring capabilities, seamless integration with other ServiceNow products, and advanced features.

Room for Improvement: Grafana needs enhancements in alerting mechanisms, more intuitive configurations, and more built-in functionalities. ServiceNow Cloud Observability would benefit from better documentation, simplified setup, and more user-friendly documentation.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Grafana is praised for easy deployment but has mixed customer service reviews. ServiceNow Cloud Observability is noted for a complex deployment process yet provides superior customer support.

Pricing and ROI: Grafana is commended for low setup costs and good ROI. ServiceNow Cloud Observability users acknowledge higher setup costs but feel the extensive feature set justifies the investment.

To learn more, read our detailed Grafana vs. ServiceNow Cloud Observability Report (Updated: August 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Grafana vs. ServiceNow Cloud Observability

August 2026

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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

Grafana

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

7th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

ServiceNow Cloud Observability

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

64th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Grafana is 2.6%, down from 6.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of ServiceNow Cloud Observability is 0.7%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Grafana	2.6%
ServiceNow Cloud Observability	0.7%
Other	96.7%

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

Featured Reviews

Vitthal Gole

Devops Engineer at AIQOD

Proactive monitoring has transformed how our teams detect issues and resolve incidents faster

For improving Grafana, the alert configuration could be more intuitive for new users. Dashboard management becomes complex in large environments. So if we have multiple environments and we have to manage our dashboards for them, sometimes it becomes complicated to manage all the dashboards. The learning curve is steep for beginners. More built-in reporting and analytics features would be helpful. Documentation for advanced features could be more detailed. Role-based access management could be simpler to configure. Performance could be optimized for very large dashboards with high cardinality data sources. Grafana could improve its alert configuration workflow and make advanced dashboard management easier for new users. More built-in reporting features would also be beneficial. A simpler onboarding experience for first-time users and more built-in dashboard templates for common monitoring scenarios would be helpful. Grafana is a powerful monitoring platform, but it could improve dashboard organization in large environments, simplify alert management, provide more built-in reporting capabilities, enhance plugin compatibility during upgrades, and offer better AI-driven insights for fast root cause analysis. For example, if we are hitting a CPU metric of ninety to ninety-five percent or a system load of seventy to eighty percent, we have to act on that. But if Grafana suggests something on that metric, such as an AI suggestion, it would be more helpful. We could get an idea of how to solve that issue. For the Grafana dashboards, they could provide more built-in compliance and audit reporting, enhance AI recommendations with clearer explanations of why an issue was flagged, enhance accessibility and keyboard navigation, add more native integrations with emerging cloud and DevOps tools, and improve scalability for very large enterprise deployments. Grafana is a mature platform, but it could benefit from better dashboard version control, simpler environment migration, enhanced AI explanations, more built-in reporting, and improved performance for large-scale deployments with complex dashboards.

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Uday-Thentu

Project Manager at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees

Automation has reduced incident impact and is driving proactive self‑healing across hybrid services

ServiceNow Cloud Observability's valuable features include AI agents that can be integrated and triggered with workflows for evaluating and taking the right action in both process and technical aspects. On the process side, it ensures the right approvals are triggered. From the technical aspect, it allows integration for taking relevant action without human intervention, moving towards self-healing. The main benefit of ServiceNow Cloud Observability is real-time data, which helps us move from being reactive to more proactive. By defining and fine-tuning workflows, we were able to implement timely notification and auto-action or auto-remediations. At the same time, if anything involves additional cost or requires intervention, it helps trigger approval notifications, and once approval is received, it timely takes the action. The AI agents help define and fine-tune those workflows further.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"This solution provides valuable insights into the health of our infrastructure in real time."

"Kubernetes could help us to better visualize the trend of our data by recording and displaying our history over a chosen duration, such as the last 30 days."

"I find Grafana beneficial due to its numerous plugins."

"It excels in providing comprehensive details when there are downtimes or fluctuations, offering thorough reports."

"The solution can scale well."

"Provides good dashboard visualization."

"The integration between Loki and Tempo is valuable."

"It gives us the visibility we need. I like that when we add deployment markers or release markers, we know exactly when an issue arises. For instance, if there is an increased usage of CPU, we can link it directly to the deployment that might have caused the issue. It increases productivity and observability. We can now easily tell when a certain issue arises. It's way easier to debug because it can point you to certain things based on these markers, and we can debug easier."

More Grafana pros

"The UI is very intuitive."

"To a certain extent, it is possible to save on the costs of the product."

"The solution Lightstep/ServiceNow has a couple of pretty advanced functionalities to help us investigate a deviation and help the development teams have better observability in the environment using distributed and complex services."

"The main benefit of ServiceNow Cloud Observability is real-time data, which helps us move from being reactive to more proactive."

"The ability to create a stream based on different parameters, operation name, service name, URL, tags, and URI part, is one valuable feature."

Cons

"Writing queries can be a bit difficult because the syntax must be maintained."

"The documentation or training provided by Grafana is limited compared to its competitors, like Splunk."

"Lacks in-depth graphs and sufficient AI."

"I find that the alerting UI in Grafana can be complex for new users."

"The solution has room for improvement with a better API to help automate the construction of the dashboards easier."

"There is room for improvement when using multiple dashboards because they can become complicated to keep track of and use."

"I would like the ability to download my results into any format in order to share the information with my clients."

"I don't believe that Grafana fulfilled the requirements completely. That's why we moved to Datadog."

More Grafana cons

"The cost could be reduced or lightweight agents and lightweight modules could be introduced, which would make it much easier to implement."

"The dashboard and graphics must be improved."

"The support team could be better. Because of the different versions of different tactics of integrating reactive code base, the documentation is not very clear if someone has to be onboard. I would rate the documentation of Lightstep a five out of ten. It could need improvement."

"In terms of licensing, users would want the product to offer them the ability to tailor the tasks offered in the solution to suit their needs."

"The design of this solution is not very intuitive and probably could come with more friendly tips for beginners."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive."

"Grafana is free and open source."

"It's free of cost; it operates as an open-source tool."

"For me, Grafana is a cheap tool because I don't have to spend much time learning the product since it is a simple solution."

"You need to purchase the solution's license for its commercial use."

"My company uses the open-source version of Grafana, so it's free."

"I give the price an eight out of ten."

"We use the open-source version of Grafana."

More Grafana pricing and cost advice

"The product is expensive. I rate the tool's pricing model an eight out of ten."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

17%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

11%

Construction Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	14
Midsize Enterprise	10
Large Enterprise	27

No data available

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Grafana?

My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is that it is very reasonable and has excellent community support.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Grafana?

Currently, I do not think that any improvement is required, but there are multiple use cases.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Grafana?

My main use case for Grafana is to create and design dashboards based on the metrics provided by different exporters via Prometheus. We have different exporters, and we are creating different dashb...

See all answers

What needs improvement with LightStep?

The cost could be reduced or lightweight agents and lightweight modules could be introduced, which would make it much easier to implement.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for LightStep?

ServiceNow Cloud Observability's main use case is end-to-end automation starting from the trigger in the cloud. Currently, it focuses more on self-healing and understanding the complete uptime of e...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering LightStep?

Regarding security, I unfortunately do not have much hands-on experience. My focus has been majorly on self-healing activities, but given what I have observed, it does provide a good opportunity in...

See all answers

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Compared 10% of the time

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Compared 8% of the time

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Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 4% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Grafana

August 2026

Download Grafana product report

Buyer's Guide

ServiceNow Cloud Observability

July 2026

Download ServiceNow Cloud Observability product report

Also Known As

No data available

LightStep

Overview

Grafana offers a customizable, user-friendly platform for robust data visualization and integration, enhancing real-time monitoring with extensive alerting and collaboration capabilities supported by an active open-source community.

Grafana stands out for its flexible dashboards and robust visualization options, integrating smoothly with tools like Prometheus. This open-source platform supports diverse environments, aiding in the visualization of IT infrastructure and business analytics. Its alerting system efficiently supports real-time monitoring. While it is praised for its community backing and cost-effectiveness, there is demand for better data aggregation, intuitive interfaces, and enhanced documentation compared to competitors such as Splunk. Simplification of configuration and the interface is sought, alongside improvements in machine learning and reporting features.

What are Grafana's most important features?

Customizable Dashboards: User-friendly, richly customizable dashboards for precise data presentation.
Visualization Capabilities: Strong support for visualizing complex datasets from multiple sources.
Integration Options: Extensive compatibility with data sources and tools like Prometheus.
Alerting System: Efficient real-time monitoring and issue identification.
Open-Source Nature: Supported by a vibrant community, offering a cost-effective solution.

What benefits or ROI should users seek in Grafana reviews?

Adaptability: Supports diverse environments and use cases.
Cost-Effectiveness: Offers valuable features at a competitive price.
Community Support: Backed by an active and vibrant open-source community.
Collaborative Platform: Seamless integration with various data tools refining monitoring and analytics efforts.

Grafana is implemented widely across industries for monitoring IT infrastructure and visualizing business analytics. Companies utilize it to analyze server performance or monitor Kubernetes environments and payment transactions. The platform integrates with AWS services and other data sources to ensure observability and system health tracking, focusing on performance metrics through customized dashboards and alerts. Organizations employ Grafana to bolster observability and optimize infrastructure through robust data insights.

Grafana Labs

ServiceNow Cloud Observability offers advanced monitoring and alerting capabilities, leveraging AI-driven automation and seamless integrations to enhance visibility and performance in hybrid environments.

ServiceNow Cloud Observability empowers teams with real-time metrics and tracing capabilities, essential for managing numerous microservices across hybrid environments. It integrates seamlessly with popular tools like Grafana, offering a single-pane view of application health and performance. This solution supports self-healing and AI automation, reducing manual interventions and enhancing reliability. Although powerful, users see room for improvement in SDK integration, documentation clarity, and dashboard design, while performance issues are noted when handling a large volume of traces.

What are the most important features of ServiceNow Cloud Observability?

Stream Creation: Enables dashboards via Grafana, enhancing data visualization.
Intuitive Notebooks: Facilitates sharing insights and collaboration.
AI Automation: Supports proactive workflows for better efficiency.
Performance Analytics: Provides comprehensive insights for decision-making.
Latency Monitoring: Ensures quick detection and response to issues.
Error Rate Monitoring: Identifies and addresses potential problems.
Correlation Detection: Enhances problem-solving through detailed analysis.
Self-Healing: Reduces manual interventions and improves service reliability.

What benefits or ROI should be considered in reviews?

Real-Time Visibility: Empowers comprehensive monitoring across microservices.
Seamless Integrations: Supports various tools like Grafana for enhanced functionality.
AI-Driven Reliability: Offers automation and self-healing for reduced downtime.
Performance Insights: Enhances strategic decision-making through detailed analytics.

ServiceNow Cloud Observability is crucial for industries relying on extensive microservices and hybrid environments. Its real-time metrics and tracing are vital for sectors like finance, technology, and telecommunications, where seamless operations and immediate responsiveness are critical.

ServiceNow

Sample Customers

Microsoft, Adobe, Optum, Sky, Nvidia, Roblox, Wells Fargo, BlackRock, Informatica, Maersk, Daimler Truck, SNCF, Atlassian, DHL, SAP, JPMorgan Chase, Cisco, Citi and many others.

InVision, Twilio, Lyft, Yext, DigitalOcean,

Buyer's Guide

Grafana vs. ServiceNow Cloud Observability

August 2026

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