Comparison · vs Grafana
When 'we'll just build it in Grafana' hits the wall.
Grafana + Prometheus + postgres_exporter ships a starter dashboard in a weekend. Then the team asks: which query? which plan? why now? Obsfly is the DBM layer Grafana was never going to be — query-aware, plan-aware, anomaly-aware, and you can keep your existing Grafana for everything else.
01. Why teams move
What teams say in the first call.
- postgres_exporter / mysqld_exporter expose counters, not normalized query digests — no top-N slow queries, no plan history.
- Building per-query collection means stitching pg_stat_statements polling, plan capture (auto_explain), and a Loki / Tempo backend yourself.
- Prometheus alerting is threshold-only; multi-variate anomaly and forecast bands live in the application layer you have to build.
- Lock-chain / blocking-session correlation needs pg_locks joining + session traversal logic — no exporter ships it.
- Engineering time to build & maintain DBM in-house is 2–3 FTE-quarters; Obsfly is a 5-minute install.
02. Honest take
What Grafana is genuinely good at.
We’re not interested in trash-talk. Here’s where Grafana is the right call — useful even if you end up choosing Obsfly, because keeping Grafana for some workloads can make sense.
- + World-class dashboard editor — keep using it for infra, app, and business KPIs.
- + Open data model. Prometheus + Loki + Tempo span the full observability stack at zero license cost.
- + Huge community + dashboard marketplace, so the starter dashboard is genuinely free.
- + Plays nicely as the visualization layer above multiple data sources, including Obsfly via our Prometheus-compatible endpoint.
03. Side by side
Obsfly vs Grafana, line by line.
04. The math
Pricing snapshot.
Public list pricing where known; “contact sales” where not. Real bills are usually within 20% of these figures.
05. Switching
How teams actually switch.
Keep Grafana, replace the exporters
Most teams keep their existing Grafana dashboards for infra. Point a new dashboard at Obsfly's Prometheus-compatible /metrics endpoint and you get every query, plan, lock-chain, and forecast band as PromQL series.
Cut the maintenance
Retire postgres_exporter / mysqld_exporter / mongodb_exporter once Obsfly is in. One agent replaces the per-DB exporter zoo and the cron jobs around them.
Pricing realism
Open source is free; engineering time to maintain DBM-grade tooling is not. We typically pay back in 1–2 quarters versus building the same in-house.
06. FAQ
Common questions.
Can I keep using Grafana as my visualization?+
Yes. Obsfly exposes a Prometheus-compatible /metrics endpoint and a webhook stream. Wire Grafana to it and your existing dashboards keep working — you just get richer series.
Why not just use postgres_exporter + Prometheus?+
It works great for cluster-level metrics (buffer hit ratio, connections, replication lag). What it doesn't do: normalize queries into digests, capture EXPLAIN plans, detect plan flips, surface lock chains, or run anomaly detection. Those are the things a real DBM has to do — and the OSS stack doesn't ship them.
What about Grafana Cloud Database Observability?+
It's a thin layer on the same exporter approach plus k6 traces. We compete on depth: per-query plan timelines, lock-chain graphs, AI rewrite, BYOC and Sovereign deployment. If you're already paying Grafana Cloud, we usually slot in alongside as the DBM layer.
How much engineering time does the DIY path actually take?+
From the design partners we've talked to: 4–8 weeks to ship something usable, then a steady 0.25–0.5 FTE to maintain query-digest collection, EXPLAIN sampling, and per-DB exporter upgrades. Add another quarter to get anomaly detection and forecasting that actually catch incidents.
Where it shows up
Obsfly for the databases you run.
People also compare
Other tools teams evaluate alongside Grafana.
vs Datadog DBM
Obsfly vs Datadog DBM
The Datadog DBM alternative for teams that watched the bill triple. Same data model, more databases, AI-native anomaly detection, BYOC and Sovereign deployment, ~1/3 the price.
vs Percona PMM
Obsfly vs Percona PMM
PMM is great at zero. The total cost — operators, ZooKeeper-style ops, dashboards-as-code, and the engineer-hours to keep it running — adds up fast. Obsfly gets you to value without the babysitting.
vs New Relic
Obsfly vs New Relic
New Relic's database visibility is part of its broader APM. Obsfly is purpose-built for databases — query digests, plan history, lock chains, AI insights — at flat per-DB pricing without ingest surprises.
Deep dives
Reading you might want before the call.
Build vs Buy
Grafana DBM build-vs-buy: what the 'we'll just use Prometheus' plan actually costs
postgres_exporter ships in an afternoon. Per-query digests, plan-flip detection, lock-chain graphs, anomaly bands — each of those costs 1–3 engineer-weeks. We measure the real build cost vs Obsfly's $39/DB and tell you when each side wins.
Postgres
pg_stat_statements: the complete 2026 guide
Every column, every gotcha, the queries you should run today, and why pg_stat_statements is still the most useful 80 lines of telemetry in Postgres — even with five new alternatives in 2026.
AI
Anomaly detection on database metrics: why thresholds fail and what works
A walk through forecast bands, change-point detection, multi-variate anomaly, and the seasonality math that makes 'p99 over 200ms' the wrong alert by default — with the Postgres example that broke our last threshold.
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See it on your stack.
20-min comparison demo. Bring real queries from your Grafana setup; we'll reproduce them in Obsfly live.