---
title: "Introduction to Grafana IRM | Grafana Cloud documentation"
description: "Learn about Grafana Incident Response Management (IRM) and its key features"
---

# Introduction to Grafana IRM

Grafana Incident Response Management (IRM) is a fully integrated solution for handling alerts and incidents within Grafana Cloud. IRM helps teams detect, respond to, and resolve issues efficiently—without switching between multiple tools.

## What is Grafana IRM?

Grafana IRM unifies on-call management and incident response, streamlining how teams receive, escalate, and resolve alerts. Embedded within Grafana Cloud, IRM eliminates context switching, speeds up resolutions, and provides real-time observability data at every step.

## Key benefits

- **Faster response times** – Route alerts to the right people instantly through escalation chains
- **Simplified on-call management** – Create schedules, rotations, and escalation policies in one place
- **Seamless collaboration** – Coordinate incident response across teams using built-in chat integrations
- **Data-driven learning** – Track response effectiveness with insights and reporting
- Integrates directly with [Grafana Alerting](/docs/grafana-cloud/alerting-and-irm/alerting/)

## How Grafana IRM works

Grafana IRM is built around the Detect → Respond → Learn workflow:

1. Detect

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- Receive alerts from Grafana Alerting, Prometheus, and other monitoring tools
- Automatically group related alerts to reduce noise
- Route alerts to the right on-call team based on configurable rules

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1. Respond

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- Acknowledge and escalate alerts through multiple notification channels
- Declare incidents manually or automatically from alerts
- Coordinate response efforts in dedicated channels with a live incident timeline

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1. Learn

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- Review past incidents with post-incident reports
- Identify root causes using Sift investigations
- Analyze trends with built-in incident metrics and dashboards

## Getting started

To begin using Grafana IRM:

1. [Configure integrations](/docs/grafana-cloud/alerting-and-irm/irm/integrations) to connect your monitoring tools
2. [Create on-call schedules](/docs/grafana-cloud/alerting-and-irm/irm/on-call-schedules) to define who receives alerts
3. [Set up notifications](/docs/grafana-cloud/alerting-and-irm/irm/notify-responders) for your team
4. [Learn about incident management](/docs/grafana-cloud/alerting-and-irm/irm/manage-incidents) workflows
5. [Review best practices](/docs/grafana-cloud/alerting-and-irm/irm/guides/best-practices) for optimal IRM configuration

## Next steps

- Explore the [IRM mobile app](/docs/grafana-cloud/alerting-and-irm/irm/mobile-app/) for on-the-go incident management
- Set up the [integration for Slack](/docs/grafana-cloud/alerting-and-irm/irm/integrations/chat-and-collaboration/slack) for chat-based incident response
- Learn about [infrastructure as code](/docs/grafana-cloud/alerting-and-irm/irm/set-up/infra-as-code) for automating IRM configuration