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PostgreSQL integration for Grafana Cloud

PostgreSQL is a free and open-source relational database management system (RDBMS) emphasizing extensibility and SQL compliance.

This integration includes 6 useful alerts and 2 pre-built dashboards to help monitor and visualize PostgreSQL metrics and logs.

Before you begin

The PostgreSQL user is required to gather metrics. While you can use root user for testing, we strongly advice that you configure a separate user for Grafana Alloy, and give it only the strictly mandatory security privileges necessary for monitoring your node, as per the official documentation.

If you want to collect logs from your PostgreSQL nodes, please check the official documentation since it only writes logs to stderr by default.

Install PostgreSQL integration for Grafana Cloud

  1. In your Grafana Cloud stack, click Connections in the left-hand menu.
  2. Find PostgreSQL and click its tile to open the integration.
  3. Review the prerequisites in the Configuration Details tab and set up Grafana Agent to send PostgreSQL metrics and logs to your Grafana Cloud instance.
  4. Click Install to add this integration’s pre-built dashboards and alerts to your Grafana Cloud instance, and you can start monitoring your PostgreSQL setup.

Configuration snippets for Grafana Alloy

Simple mode

These snippets are configured to scrape a single PostgreSQL node running locally with default ports.

Manually copy and append the following snippets into your Grafana Alloy configuration file.

Integrations snippets

alloy 
prometheus.exporter.postgres "integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    data_source_names = ["postgresql://localhost:5432/postgres"]
}
discovery.relabel "integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets = prometheus.exporter.postgres.integrations_postgres_exporter.targets

    rule {
        target_label = "instance"
        replacement  = constants.hostname
    }
    rule {                
        target_label = "job"
        replacement  = "integrations/postgres_exporter"
    }
}
prometheus.scrape "integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets    = discovery.relabel.integrations_postgres_exporter.output
    forward_to = [prometheus.remote_write.metrics_service.receiver]
    job_name   = "integrations/postgres_exporter"
}

Logs snippets

darwin

alloy 
local.file_match "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    path_targets = [{
        __address__ = "localhost",
        __path__    = "/var/log/postgresql/postgres.log",
        instance    = constants.hostname,
        job         = "integrations/postgres_exporter",
    }]
}
loki.source.file "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets    = local.file_match.logs_integrations_postgres_exporter.targets
    forward_to = [loki.write.grafana_cloud_loki.receiver]
}

linux

alloy 
local.file_match "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    path_targets = [{
        __address__ = "localhost",
        __path__    = "/var/log/postgresql/postgres.log",
        instance    = constants.hostname,
        job         = "integrations/postgres_exporter",
    }]
}
loki.source.file "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets    = local.file_match.logs_integrations_postgres_exporter.targets
    forward_to = [loki.write.grafana_cloud_loki.receiver]
}

windows

alloy 
local.file_match "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    path_targets = [{
        __address__ = "localhost",
        __path__    = "C:\\Program Files\\PostgreSQL\\*\\data\\pg_log",
        instance    = constants.hostname,
        job         = "integrations/postgres_exporter",
    }]
}
loki.source.file "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets    = local.file_match.logs_integrations_postgres_exporter.targets
    forward_to = [loki.write.grafana_cloud_loki.receiver]
}

Advanced mode

To instruct Grafana Alloy to scrape your PostgreSQL nodes, go though the subsequent instructions.

The snippets provide examples to guide you through the configuration process.

First, manually copy and append the following snippets into your Grafana Alloy configuration file.

Then follow the instructions below to modify the necessary variables.

Advanced integrations snippets

alloy 
prometheus.exporter.postgres "integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    data_source_names = ["postgresql://localhost:5432/postgres"]
}
discovery.relabel "integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets = prometheus.exporter.postgres.integrations_postgres_exporter.targets

    rule {
        target_label = "instance"
        replacement  = constants.hostname
    }
    rule {                
        target_label = "job"
        replacement  = "integrations/postgres_exporter"
    }
}
prometheus.scrape "integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets    = discovery.relabel.integrations_postgres_exporter.output
    forward_to = [prometheus.remote_write.metrics_service.receiver]
    job_name   = "integrations/postgres_exporter"
}

Add a pair of prometheus.exporter.postgres and discovery.relabel to your Grafana Alloy configuration to monitor a Postgres instance.

For ease of use, the provided snippets sets the instance label to the hostname using the constants.hostname Agent Flow constant variable. If you are scraping using a remote Agent Flow instance please change it to a value that identifies this instance.

Make sure to change the data_source_names to the addresses of the Postgres server you want to monitor in the agent config.

Refer to the linked documentation for the full array of options.

Finally, reference each discovery.relabel component within the targets property of the prometheus.scrape component.

Advanced logs snippets

darwin

alloy 
local.file_match "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    path_targets = [{
        __address__ = "localhost",
        __path__    = "/var/log/postgresql/postgres.log",
        instance    = constants.hostname,
        job         = "integrations/postgres_exporter",
    }]
}
loki.source.file "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets    = local.file_match.logs_integrations_postgres_exporter.targets
    forward_to = [loki.write.grafana_cloud_loki.receiver]
}

To collect logs from unix-like systems, you need a pair of loki.source.file, and local.file_match components.

The provided snippet is pre-configured with the default log write location for unix-like OS environments.

If you wish to capture other log files, you must add new maps to the path_targets list parameter of the local.file_match component, and include it in the targets list of loki.source.file component. Make sure that the new entry has the same instance and job labels, so it is matched to the correct instance to be shown in the Logs dashboard.

The log write location depends on your PostgreSQL configuration, make sure to configure __path__ within local.file_match accordingly.

linux

alloy 
local.file_match "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    path_targets = [{
        __address__ = "localhost",
        __path__    = "/var/log/postgresql/postgres.log",
        instance    = constants.hostname,
        job         = "integrations/postgres_exporter",
    }]
}
loki.source.file "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets    = local.file_match.logs_integrations_postgres_exporter.targets
    forward_to = [loki.write.grafana_cloud_loki.receiver]
}

To collect logs from unix-like systems, you need a pair of loki.source.file, and local.file_match components.

The provided snippet is pre-configured with the default log write location for unix-like OS environments.

If you wish to capture other log files, you must add new maps to the path_targets list parameter of the local.file_match component, and include it in the targets list of loki.source.file component. Make sure that the new entry has the same instance and job labels, so it is matched to the correct instance to be shown in the Logs dashboard.

The log write location depends on your PostgreSQL configuration, make sure to configure __path__ within local.file_match accordingly.

windows

alloy 
local.file_match "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    path_targets = [{
        __address__ = "localhost",
        __path__    = "C:\\Program Files\\PostgreSQL\\*\\data\\pg_log",
        instance    = constants.hostname,
        job         = "integrations/postgres_exporter",
    }]
}
loki.source.file "logs_integrations_postgres_exporter" {
    targets    = local.file_match.logs_integrations_postgres_exporter.targets
    forward_to = [loki.write.grafana_cloud_loki.receiver]
}

To collect logs from Windows systems, you need a pair of loki.source.file, and local.file_match components.

The provided snippet is pre-configured with the default log write location for Windows OS environments.

If you wish to capture other log files, you must add new maps to the path_targets list parameter of the local.file_match component, and include it in the targets list of loki.source.file component. Make sure that the new entry has the same instance and job labels, so it is matched to the correct instance to be shown in the Logs dashboard.

The log write location depends on your PostgreSQL configuration, make sure to configure __path__ within local.file_match accordingly.

You can also configure your PostgreSQL nodes to write logs to eventlog, in which case you will need to use the loki.source.windowsevent component instead of local.file_match and loki.source.file.

Grafana Agent static configuration (deprecated)

The following section shows configuration for running Grafana Agent in static mode which is deprecated. You should use Grafana Alloy for all new deployments.

Dashboards

The PostgreSQL integration installs the following dashboards in your Grafana Cloud instance to help monitor your system.

  • PostgreSQL logs
  • PostgreSQL overview

PostgreSQL overview dashboard

PostgreSQL overview dashboard

PostgreSQL logs dashboard

PostgreSQL logs dashboard

Alerts

The PostgreSQL integration includes the following useful alerts:

AlertDescription
PostgreSQLMaxConnectionsReachedWarning: Postgres connections count is over the maximum amount.
PostgreSQLHighConnectionsWarning: Postgres connections count is over 80% of maximum amount.
PostgreSQLDownWarning: PostgreSQL is not processing queries.
PostgreSQLSlowQueriesWarning: PostgreSQL high number of slow queries.
PostgreSQLQPSWarning: PostgreSQL high number of queries per second.
PostgreSQLCacheHitRatioWarning: PostgreSQL low cache hit rate.

Metrics

The most important metrics provided by the PostgreSQL integration, which are used on the pre-built dashboards and Prometheus alerts, are as follows:

  • pg_settings_max_connections
  • pg_settings_superuser_reserved_connections
  • pg_stat_activity_count
  • pg_stat_activity_max_tx_duration
  • pg_stat_bgwriter_buffers_alloc_total
  • pg_stat_bgwriter_buffers_backend_fsync_total
  • pg_stat_bgwriter_buffers_backend_total
  • pg_stat_bgwriter_buffers_checkpoint_total
  • pg_stat_bgwriter_buffers_clean_total
  • pg_stat_database_blks_hit
  • pg_stat_database_blks_read
  • pg_stat_database_conflicts
  • pg_stat_database_deadlocks
  • pg_stat_database_numbackends
  • pg_stat_database_tup_deleted
  • pg_stat_database_tup_fetched
  • pg_stat_database_tup_inserted
  • pg_stat_database_tup_returned
  • pg_stat_database_tup_updated
  • pg_stat_database_xact_commit
  • pg_stat_database_xact_rollback
  • pg_up
  • up

Changelog

md 
# 1.0.4 - May 2024

* Update mixin to accommodate pg_stat_bgwriter counter metrics name changes. Updated in Grafana Alloy and Grafana Agent v0.40.5.

# 1.0.3 - September 2023

* New Filter Metrics option for configuring the Grafana Agent, which saves on metrics cost by dropping any metric not used by this integration. Beware that anything custom built using metrics that are not on the snippet will stop working.
* New hostname relabel option, which applies the instance name you write on the text box to the Grafana Agent configuration snippets, making it easier and less error prone to configure this mandatory label.

# 1.0.2 - August 2023

* Add regex filter for logs datasource

# 1.0.1 - August 2023

* Fix typo in agent instructions

# 1.0.0 - August 2023

* Add K8s support
* Add Logs dashboard
* Support cluster/multicluster visualization
* New Filter Metrics option for configuring the Grafana Agent, which saves on metrics cost by dropping any metric not used by this integration. Beware that anything custom built using metrics that are not on the snippet will stop working.
* New hostname relabel option, which applies the instance name you write on the text box to the Grafana Agent configuration snippets, making it easier and less error prone to configure this mandatory label.

# 0.0.4 - April 2023

* Fix cache hit ratio panel
* Use psql specific metric pg_up to avoid return of postgres unrelated instances
* Change panels to timeseries
* Move QPS to left and remove transparency for common style
* Fix conflict/deadlock metrics

# 0.0.3 - May 2022

* Use `$job` template variable in selectors for all queries
* Reorder template variables in dashboard UI
* Enable multi-select for job and instance template variables
* Filter instance template variable query by selected value(s) for job template variable

# 0.0.2 - October 2021

* Update all rate queries to use `$__rate_interval`

# 0.0.1 - December 2020

* Initial release

Cost

By connecting your PostgreSQL instance to Grafana Cloud, you might incur charges. To view information on the number of active series that your Grafana Cloud account uses for metrics included in each Cloud tier, see Active series and dpm usage and Cloud tier pricing.