Improve existing panels

Follow this guide to diagnose and refine panels that already exist in Grafana. It walks you through inspection, adjustment, and communication so you can ship improvements with confidence.

What you’ll achieve

Understand what a panel currently displays and identify gaps or inaccuracies.
Apply targeted fixes, such as query changes, visualization tweaks, and descriptions, and verify the results.
Document the changes so future viewers know what to expect from the updated panel.

Before you begin

Dashboard access: Open the dashboard in edit mode.
Panel context: Mention the panel with @panel or provide the dashboard link so the Assistant can retrieve the configuration.

Diagnose the panel

Ask Grafana Assistant to summarize the current panel so you understand the data, query, and configuration before making changes.

Ask the Assistant to inspect the panel and summarize what it shows.

Explain the "Request latency" panel on the checkout dashboard.

If the explanation does not match your expectations, request a query review.

Check the panel for accuracy and update the PromQL query to ignore 5xx retries.

Capture the diff in chat so you can audit what changed before saving. Share concrete examples (specific labels, time ranges, screenshots) to help the Assistant focus on the exact issue.

Apply improvements

Request the exact query, visualization, and description updates you need, iterating with the Assistant until the panel reflects the desired state.

Refine queries: ask for aggregations, label filters, or mathematical adjustments.
Tweak visualization: request a different panel type or display option, for example, Switch this panel to a table showing p95 by region.
Update descriptions: ask the Assistant to provide a plain-language caption for teammates.
Break complex adjustments into sequential prompts and correct the Assistant politely if the change misses the mark.

Validate and save

Confirm the refreshed panel behaves as expected, then commit the changes so teammates benefit from the improvements.

Verify the updated panel renders the expected data.
Use Save dashboard to persist the changes.
Summarize the improvements in your change log or incident timeline if the work occurred during a response.

The panel now reflects the correct query, visualization, and description. Share the summary with your team and note the change in your dashboard history or incident record.

Troubleshooting

Query fails after edits: ask the Assistant to roll back to the previous version, for example, Revert the query to what it was before the last change.
Panel not found: ensure the @panel mention resolves correctly, or provide the panel ID from the dashboard URL.
Visualization mismatch: specify the exact panel type (Time series, Bar gauge, Stat) and any thresholds or color mappings you need.
Changing focus mid-chat: start a new Assistant conversation before editing a different dashboard so earlier context does not bleed into the request.