Grafana
Grist
| Feature | Grafana | Grist |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free / from $29/mo | Free / from $10/mo |
| Free Plan | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Rating | 4.6 / 5 | 4.3 / 5 |
| Best For | devops-teams, sre-teams, data-engineers, iot-monitoring | developers, data-teams, non-profits, open-source-advocates |
| Founded | 2014 | 2019 |
| Dashboards | ✓ | ✗ |
| Data Sources | ✓ | ✗ |
| Alerting | ✓ | ✗ |
| Annotations | ✓ | ✗ |
| Plugins | ✓ | ✗ |
| Loki Logs | ✓ | ✗ |
| Tempo Traces | ✓ | ✗ |
| Mimir Metrics | ✓ | ✗ |
| Relational Data | ✗ | ✓ |
| Python Formulas | ✗ | ✓ |
| Custom Widgets | ✗ | ✓ |
| Access Rules | ✗ | ✓ |
| Incremental Imports | ✗ | ✓ |
| Api | ✗ | ✓ |
✓ Grafana Pros
- Connects to virtually any data source
- Beautiful and highly customizable dashboards
- Open-source with massive community
- Grafana Cloud includes Loki, Tempo, and Mimir
- Alerting across all data sources
✗ Grafana Cons
- Self-hosting requires DevOps expertise
- Dashboard creation has a learning curve
- Plugin quality varies
✓ Grist Pros
- Fully open-source (Apache 2.0)
- Python formulas instead of spreadsheet formulas
- Self-hostable
- Strong access control and permissions
✗ Grist Cons
- Fewer integrations than Airtable
- Smaller template library
- Less intuitive for non-technical users
The Verdict
Grafana is built for devops teams and sre teams, with a focus on dashboards and data-sources. Grist targets developers and data teams and leads with relational-data and python-formulas.
On pricing, Grist is the clear winner for budget-conscious users — starting at $10/mo compared to $29/mo for Grafana. That $19/mo difference adds up quickly for growing teams.
Both offer free plans, so you can test each with your real workflow before committing to a subscription.
Feature-wise, Grafana offers broader built-in capabilities (8 features vs 6), while Grist takes a more focused approach — which can mean a simpler, faster onboarding experience.
Bottom line: Grafana has a slight overall edge — but if fully open-source (apache 2.0) matters most to you, Grist may still be the right call.