Menu

Caution

Grafana Alloy is the new name for our distribution of the OTel collector. Grafana Agent has been deprecated and is in Long-Term Support (LTS) through October 31, 2025. Grafana Agent will reach an End-of-Life (EOL) on November 1, 2025. Read more about why we recommend migrating to Grafana Alloy.

Important: This documentation is about an older version. It's relevant only to the release noted, many of the features and functions have been updated or replaced. Please view the current version.

Documentationbreadcrumb arrow Grafana Agentbreadcrumb arrow Static mode
Open source RSS

Static mode

Static mode is the original mode of Grafana Agent, and is the most mature. Static mode is composed of different subsystems:

  • The metrics subsystem wraps around Prometheus for collecting Prometheus metrics and forwarding them over the Prometheus remote_write protocol.

  • The logs subsystem wraps around Grafana Promtail for collecting logs and forwarding them to Grafana Loki.

  • The traces subsystem wraps around OpenTelemetry Collector for collecting traces and forwarding them to Grafana Tempo or any OpenTelemetry-compatible endpoint.

Static mode is configured with a YAML file.

Static mode works with:

  • Grafana Cloud
  • Grafana Enterprise Stack
  • OSS deployments of Grafana Loki, Grafana Mimir, Grafana Tempo, and Prometheus

This topic helps you to think about what you’re trying to accomplish and how to use Grafana Agent to meet your goals.

You can set up and configure Grafana Agent in static mode manually, or you can follow the common workflows described in this topic.

Topics

Static mode Grafana Agent for Grafana Cloud integrations

There are different ways for you to set up Grafana Agent to scrape data—through Grafana’s integration platform or directly. Select a guide to get started:

TopicDescription
Get started with monitoring using an integrationWalk through installing a Linux integration using Grafana Agent in the Grafana Cloud interface.
Install and manage integrationsView general steps for using Grafana Cloud integrations to install Grafana Agent to collect data. See supported integrations.
Ship your metrics to Grafana Cloud without an integrationIf you want to ship your Prometheus metrics to Grafana Cloud but there isn’t an integration available, you can use a Prometheus exporter and deploy Grafana Agent to scrape your local machine or service.
Change your metrics scrape intervalLearn about reducing your total data points per minute (DPM) by adjusting your scrape interval.

Static mode Grafana Agent for Kubernetes Monitoring

Grafana Kubernetes Monitoring provides a simplified approach to monitoring your Kubernetes fleet by deploying Grafana Agent with useful defaults for collecting metrics. Select a guide to get started monitoring Kubernetes:

TopicDescription
Configure Kubernetes Monitoring using AgentUse the Kubernetes Monitoring solution to set up monitoring of your Kubernetes cluster and to install preconfigured dashboards and alerts.
Ship Kubernetes traces using Grafana Agent directlyDeploy Grafana Agent into your Kubernetes cluster as a deployment and configure it to collect traces for your Kubernetes workloads.

Use Grafana Agent directly to scrape telemetry data

Grafana Cloud integration workflows and the Kubernetes Monitoring solution are the easiest ways to get started collecting telemetry data, but sometimes you might want to use a manual approach to set your configuration options.

TopicDescription
Install or uninstall Grafana AgentInstall or uninstall Grafana Agent.
Troubleshoot Cloud Integrations installation on LinuxTroubleshoot common errors when executing the Grafana Agent installation script on Linux.
Troubleshoot Cloud Integrations installation on MacTroubleshoot common errors when executing the Grafana Agent installation script on Mac.
Troubleshoot Cloud Integrations installation on WindowsTroubleshoot common errors when executing the Grafana Agent installation script on Windows.

Use Grafana Agent to send logs to Grafana Loki

Logs are included when you set up a Cloud integration but you can take a more hands-on approach with the following guide.

TopicDescription
Collect logs with Grafana AgentInstall Grafana Agent to collect logs for use with Grafana Loki, included with your Grafana Cloud account.

Use Grafana Agent to send traces to Grafana Tempo

TopicDescription
Set up and use tracingInstall Grafana Agent to collect traces for use with Grafana Tempo, included with your Grafana Cloud account.
Use Grafana Agent as a tracing pipelineGrafana Agent can be configured to run a set of tracing pipelines to collect data from your applications and write it to Grafana Tempo. Pipelines are built using OpenTelemetry, and consist of receivers, processors, and exporters.