Grafana MCP server

This documentation helps you install and run the open source Grafana MCP server, connect MCP-compatible clients, and configure authentication, transports, and tools.

The Grafana MCP server is a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that gives AI assistants and LLM clients access to your Grafana instance. You can query metrics and logs, search and manage dashboards, manage alert rules, work with Grafana Incident and Sift, and generate deeplinks to Grafana resources.

Choose the right Grafana MCP option

Grafana offers two MCP server options:

Option	Best for	Authentication
Open source Grafana MCP server	Running and managing the MCP server yourself for Grafana Cloud or self-managed Grafana	Service account token
Grafana Cloud MCP server	Connecting external AI agents to Grafana Cloud without installing a local server	OAuth 2.1 browser authorization, scoped to the signed-in Grafana user

Use this documentation for the open source server. For Grafana Cloud’s hosted MCP server, refer to Grafana Cloud MCP server.

Overview

Use the Grafana MCP server to let your preferred MCP-compatible client (for example, Claude Desktop, Cursor, or VS Code with Copilot) talk to Grafana. The server exposes tools for dashboards, datasources (Prometheus, Loki, and others), alerting, incidents, OnCall, and more. You configure which tools are enabled and how the server connects to Grafana (authentication and transport).

Quick start

This quick start requires uv. Add this to your MCP client configuration (for example Claude Desktop or Cursor):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "grafana": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["mcp-grafana"],
      "env": {
        "GRAFANA_URL": "http://localhost:3000",
        "GRAFANA_SERVICE_ACCOUNT_TOKEN": "<your service account token>"
      }
    }
  }
}

When using this open source server with Grafana Cloud, set GRAFANA_URL to your instance URL (for example https://myinstance.grafana.net). Refer to Clients and Set up for next steps.

Grafana 9.0 or later is required for full functionality. Some features, particularly datasource-related operations, may not work correctly with earlier versions due to missing API endpoints.

Explore the docs

Clients – Cursor, Claude Desktop, VS Code, and more.
Set up – uvx, Docker, binary, Helm, and client configuration examples.
Configure – Authentication, command-line flags, transports, TLS, and tools.
Introduction – MCP concepts and RBAC overview.
Reference – MCP tools reference (tools, permissions, scopes, and RBAC guidance).
Guides – Query metrics and logs, dashboards, alerts, deeplinks, incidents.
Troubleshooting – Common issues including Grafana version compatibility.
Developer – Go SDK, observability, build and test.