---
title: "How Database Observability and integrations differ | Grafana Labs"
description: "How Grafana Cloud Database Observability and database integrations differ"
---

> For a curated documentation index, see [llms.txt](/llms.txt). For the complete documentation index, see [llms-full.txt](/llms-full.txt).

# Two different layers

A database integration and Database Observability aren’t two versions of the same product, and you don’t choose one over the other. They monitor different layers of the database and answer different questions.

|                         | Database Observability                                                                                           | Database integration                                                                                                    |
|-------------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| **What it monitors**    | Tracked queries                                                                                                  | The database instance as a whole                                                                                        |
| **Question it answers** | How do tracked queries perform, and why?                                                                         | Is the database healthy?                                                                                                |
| **What you see**        | Rate, errors, and duration for tracked queries, explain plans for SELECT queries, wait events, and query samples | Aggregate, instance-level metrics such as connections, throughput, and replication, with prebuilt dashboards and alerts |
| **Databases**           | MySQL and PostgreSQL                                                                                             | Many, including MongoDB, Redis, Memcached, Cassandra, Oracle, MySQL, and PostgreSQL                                     |