# Last9 vs Grafana: A Grafana Alternative Without Per-Series Billing > Last9 vs Grafana compared on AI and MCP, what the AI costs and where it runs, Grafana Cloud pricing, active-series billing, ingest-time control, deployment in your own cloud, and APM, with where each one fits. Source: https://last9.io/compare/grafana/ Both have an AI assistant, an SRE agent, and an MCP server. Last9 uses your model provider, charges nothing per investigation, runs in your own cloud account, and bills one licence. Grafana is the dashboard ops teams know, with the widest set of data sources. Last9 starts from your services, and your Grafana dashboards come with you. - **Gartner Cool Vendor 2025:** Named a Gartner® Cool Vendor in AI for SRE and Observability, cited for its unified telemetry platform. - **Your model, your cloud:** The Last9 agent runs on your model provider, with no per-investigation charge, in your own cloud account. - **One licence:** No meter per active series or per GB. The infrastructure runs on your own cloud bill. ## Last9 vs Grafana at a glance The questions engineering teams ask when they compare the two. | | **Last9** | **Grafana** | |---|---|---| | Does it have an MCP server for coding agents? | ✓ Yes, a hosted MCP server for any MCP client. An agent can also add drop rules and edit dashboards through it | ✓ Yes, an open-source server and a hosted Grafana Cloud server. An agent can edit dashboards, alert rules, and incidents through them | | What does the AI cost? | ✓ No per-query or per-investigation charge | Grafana Cloud bills each active AI user, plus tokens. Anyone who connects through the hosted MCP server counts as an AI user | | Can the AI use our model provider, in our own cloud? | ✓ Yes. The Last9 agent runs on your model provider or inference endpoint, and Last9 runs in your own cloud account | No. Grafana Assistant runs on Claude through Grafana's own providers, with no documented option to bring your own model | | How is it priced? | ✓ One licence. The infrastructure runs on your own cloud bill, at your negotiated rates | Grafana Cloud meters each signal on its own: active series, GB of logs and traces, users, host hours, and AI users. The self-managed stack has no licence fee, and your team runs it | | How much metric cardinality can I keep? | ✓ 20M series per metric per day by default, with no sampling and no charge per label or metric name | No fixed cap, but Grafana Cloud bills each active series, so every new label value adds to the bill | | Can I filter telemetry before I pay to store it? | ✓ Yes. The Control Plane drops, aggregates, and routes at ingest | ✓ Yes. Adaptive Telemetry drops or aggregates unused metrics, logs, traces, and profiles, in every Grafana Cloud tier | | Can it run in our own cloud account? | ✓ Yes. Last9 runs in your own cloud account, on AWS or GCP in any region, and manages it for you | ✓ Yes. BYOC runs Grafana Cloud in your AWS or GCP account, on request. A self-managed stack runs anywhere, without the Cloud-only AI and Adaptive Telemetry | | What about our APM agents and integrations? | ✓ APM from OpenTelemetry is part of the platform, with 100+ integrations, plus anything with OpenTelemetry or Prometheus | Application Observability is a separate Grafana Cloud product, billed by host hours, with 100+ integrations | | What about data in our other tools? | Last9 stores the telemetry you send it over OpenTelemetry and Prometheus | ✓ Grafana queries data where it lives, from SQL databases to CloudWatch and Elasticsearch, and adds on-call, incidents, and k6 load tests | ## AI on your model, in your cloud - **Last9:** One assistant in the app, in Slack, and in your IDE through MCP. It investigates, builds a diagnosis dashboard, and hands you the link. - **Last9:** The production agent, Last9, responds to pages with context from Slack, Linear, and PagerDuty. It runs on your model provider or inference endpoint and picks the model for each step. Customer data is never used for training. - **Last9:** An agent can do more than read. Through MCP it can add a drop rule and stop ingesting the noisy source it found. - **Last9:** Click a point on a chart, a table row, an alert, or an exception, and choose Ask Last9 AI. The investigation starts from that value, in its service context. - **Grafana:** Grafana Assistant, Assistant Investigations, and a hosted MCP server are generally available in Grafana Cloud. They are billed per active AI user plus tokens, and run on Claude through Grafana's providers. Self-managed Grafana reaches the Assistant through a linked Grafana Cloud stack. ## One licence instead of a meter per signal - **Last9:** Labels like customer_id or tenant stay on the metric, with no charge per label or metric name. - **Last9:** Drop, remap, redact, forward, and aggregate metrics, logs, and traces at ingest, from the UI. Every rule is previewed against live data before you save it. - **Grafana:** Grafana Cloud bills metrics per active series and logs, traces, and profiles per GB, with separate meters for users, host hours, and AI users. Adaptive Telemetry cuts what each meter counts, in every tier. - **Matters most for:** Teams whose per-customer or per-tenant labels grow faster than their budget. ## Your cloud, your dashboards, your services - **Last9:** Last9 runs single-tenant in your own cloud account, on AWS or GCP in any region, and manages it for you. Every feature runs there, including the AI. - **Last9:** Your Grafana dashboards and alerts import into Last9's embedded Grafana, and convert to native Last9 dashboards when you are ready. Your own Grafana can also query Last9 metrics as a Prometheus data source. - **Last9:** APM starts from your services: discovery, dependency maps, database and external calls, Apdex, exceptions, and trace correlation, from OpenTelemetry. - **Grafana:** BYOC runs Grafana Cloud in your AWS or GCP account, operated by Grafana. The self-managed stack is open source, and your team operates Mimir, Loki, and Tempo, without Assistant, Investigations, or Adaptive Telemetry. - **Matters most for:** Teams that run LGTM themselves and want it managed, and app teams that want service views instead of panels they build. ## Which one fits your team? **Choose Last9 if:** - You want AI on your own model provider, with no charge per investigation - You want one licence instead of a meter for each signal - Your metrics carry per-customer or per-tenant labels, and active-series billing is the complaint - You run LGTM yourselves and want it managed, inside your own cloud account - Your app teams want service views, not panels they build themselves **Choose Grafana if:** - Your ops team builds and owns its dashboards across many data sources - You want on-call, incidents, and k6 load tests from the same vendor - You want to run the open-source stack yourselves, with no licence fee - Your cardinality is under control, so active-series billing stays predictable ## Moving off Grafana What the switch involves, and what Last9 does for you. - **Forward deployed engineers:** A Last9 engineer runs the move with your team. - **1-click dashboard and alert import:** Grafana dashboards and alerts import in one click into Last9's embedded Grafana, so your team keeps its workflow. Convert dashboards to native Last9 dashboards when you are ready. - **Keep your instrumentation:** Anything sending OpenTelemetry or Prometheus remote write needs only a new endpoint. Grafana Alloy can send the same logs to Last9 over OTLP while Loki keeps running. - **Run both:** Keep Grafana for the data in your other tools, and add Last9 metrics to it as a Prometheus data source. Compare the two on your own incidents as you go. ## The objections we hear most Each one is a fair reason to hesitate. ### Grafana already has Grafana Assistant, Investigations, and an MCP server. Why switch for AI? AI alone is not the difference. What differs is the model, the cost, and where it runs: the Last9 agent runs on your model provider, has no per-investigation charge, and runs inside your own cloud account. ### We can get BYOC from Grafana, or self-host the LGTM stack. Both are real options. BYOC runs Grafana Cloud in your account, operated by Grafana. Self-hosting has no licence fee, and your team then operates Mimir, Loki, and Tempo, without the Cloud-only AI and Adaptive Telemetry. Last9 runs in your own cloud account, manages it for you, and bills one licence. ### Our dashboards, alerts, and queries all live in Grafana. Dashboards and alerts import into Last9's embedded Grafana, so the workflow stays the same, and PromQL and LogQL run natively. Convert dashboards to native Last9 dashboards when you are ready. A Last9 engineer scopes the move with you before you sign. ### Adaptive Telemetry already cuts our Grafana Cloud bill. It does, and it runs in every Grafana Cloud tier. It reduces what each meter counts, but the meters stay: active series, GB, users, and AI users are still billed. Last9 is one licence, with the infrastructure on your own cloud bill. ### Is Last9 proven at our scale? Last9 regularly handles 500M+ events a minute and 60M+ concurrent users, and has monitored 12 of the world's 20 largest streaming events. It is SOC 2 Type II certified and PCI ready, with SSO and access controls. Teams across fintech, healthcare, gaming, media, and commerce run it in production, including Replit, Pine Labs, Tata 1mg, and Housing.com. ## FAQ ### Is Last9 a good Grafana alternative? Yes, for teams on Grafana Cloud or a self-managed LGTM stack that want AI on their own model provider with no per-investigation charge, one licence instead of a meter per signal, high-cardinality metrics, or a managed deployment inside their own cloud account. Grafana fits better if your team queries many data sources in place, or wants on-call and load testing from the same vendor. ### How does Last9's MCP server compare with the Grafana MCP server? Grafana has an open-source MCP server and, since July 2026, a hosted Grafana Cloud MCP server, and both can edit dashboards, alert rules, and incidents. Last9's hosted MCP server works with any MCP client, such as Claude Code or Cursor, and can add drop rules and edit dashboards, so an agent can change what is ingested. ### How does Last9's AI compare with Grafana Assistant? Grafana Assistant and Assistant Investigations run in Grafana Cloud, billed per active AI user plus tokens, on Claude through Grafana's providers, and self-managed Grafana reaches them through a linked Grafana Cloud stack. The Last9 agent has no per-query or per-investigation charge, and runs on your model provider inside your own cloud account. ### How does Last9 billing compare with Grafana Cloud pricing? Grafana Cloud pricing meters each signal on its own: active series for metrics, GB for logs, traces, and profiles, plus users, host hours, and AI users. Last9 is one licence, and the infrastructure runs on your own cloud bill at your negotiated rates. ### How does Last9 compare with Grafana Mimir? Grafana Mimir stores metrics for Grafana Cloud, which bills each active series, and for self-managed stacks, where your team operates it. Last9 keeps high-cardinality labels with no sampling, allows 20M series per metric per day by default, has no charge per label or metric name, and answers the same PromQL. ### Is there an LGTM stack alternative that runs in our cloud account? Yes. A self-managed LGTM stack runs in your cloud, and your team operates Loki, Tempo, and Mimir, without Grafana Cloud's Assistant or Adaptive Telemetry, while Grafana's BYOC runs Grafana Cloud in your AWS or GCP account. Last9 runs single-tenant in your own cloud account, on AWS or GCP in any region, and manages it for you. ### Can Last9 replace Grafana APM? Grafana's APM is Application Observability, a Grafana Cloud product billed by host hours. Last9 covers service discovery, dependency maps, database and external calls, Apdex, exceptions, and trace correlation, from OpenTelemetry, as part of the platform. ### Can Last9 run alongside Grafana? Yes. Grafana queries many data sources, and Last9 metrics can be one of them as a Prometheus data source, so your dashboards keep working. Keep Grafana for the data in your other tools, and a Last9 engineer plans the split with your team. ### How do I migrate from Grafana to Last9? Grafana dashboards and alerts import into Last9's embedded Grafana, and PromQL and LogQL run natively, so the workflow stays the same. Anything sending OpenTelemetry or Prometheus remote write needs only a new endpoint. Convert dashboards to native Last9 dashboards when you are ready, and a Last9 engineer runs the move with your team.