Differences between Grafana versions - Amazon Managed Grafana
Grafana version 10Grafana version 9

Differences between Grafana versions

When creating a Grafana workspace, you must choose a Grafana version to create. You can choose between versions compatible with Grafana versions 8, 9, and 10. Each of these has added functionality from the previous version. The following topics describe the changes in versions 9 and 10, including changes in version 10 that might break functionality that you use in version 9.

Note

You can read version-specific documentation for using your Grafana workspace in the Working in Grafana version 8, Working in Grafana version 9, and Working in Grafana version 10 topics.

For detailed notes by version, and more information from Grafana Labs, see What's new in Grafana in the Grafana Labs documentation.

Grafana version 10

The following features were added in Grafana version 10.

  • Correlations – Correlations define how data in one data source is used to query data in another data source, and allow the Explore visualization to easily run queries related to the shown data. For more details, see Correlations in Grafana version 10.

  • Subfolders – When organizing your dashboards, you can now use subfolders to create a nested hierarchy. For more details, see Creating dashboard folders.

  • Alerts – Grafana alerting now supports silencing alerts. Additionally, Grafana alerting no longer sends notifications 3 times.

  • Alerting upgrade preview – Before upgrading from classic dashboard alerts to Grafana alerts, you can see what your alerts will look like, and even make changes that are applied when migrating. For more details, see Migrating classic dashboard alerts to Grafana alerting. Grafana Labs has announced that Grafana version 11 and beyond will no longer support classic dashboard alerts.

  • Support bundles – Support bundles provide a simple way to collect information about your Grafana workspace to share with product support. You can quickly create a support bundle containing data about migrations, plugins, settings, and more. For more details, see Gather information for support.

  • New visualizations – Three new visualizations are available. XY Chart, Datagrid, and Trend panel are all available for workspaces compatible with version 10. Version 9 workspaces can also use XY Charts.

  • PagerDuty – The Enterprise plugins now include a plugin for PagerDuty.

  • Transformations redesign – The transformations tab has an improved user experience and visual design. Transformations are categorized, and each transformation type has an illustration to help you choose the right one.

  • Prometheus metric encyclopedia – The metrics dropdown for Prometheus metrics in the Prometheus query builder has been replaced with a paginated and searchable metric encyclopedia.

  • API key UI discontinued – Service accounts are the recommended way to authenticate calls to the Grafana HTTP APIs. As part of Grafana Labs work toward discontinuing API keys, you can no longer create API keys through the workspace user interface. You can only create API keys through the AWS APIs.

    For more information about the discontinuation of API keys by Grafana Labs, see APIKeys: Sunsetting of API keys in the Grafana GitHub issues list.

Breaking changes

The Grafana version 10.4 release includes changes from Grafana versions 9.5 through 10.4. Grafana versions 10.0 and 10.3 had some changes that might break functionality in some cases. When updating to a new version, it is recommended to test in a non-production environment before updating your production workspaces.

The following changes might affect some users updating to Grafana version 10.

  • Angular discontinued – Plugins that use Angular will no longer be supported in future releases of Grafana. In version 10, panels that use angular will show a banner stating that they use a discontinued feature, to give a notice that they won't work in future versions.

  • Alias in CloudWatch removed – Alias patterns in the CloudWatch query editor were replaced by Label (dynamic labels).

    Open any dashboard that uses the Alias field, and save it. Alias is migrated to Label automatically.

  • Older plugins need to be upgraded – The plugins for Athena and Amazon Redshift data source must be updated in Grafana v10 workspaces. The Athena data source plugin must be version 2.9.3 or newer; the Amazon Redshift data source plugin must be version 1.8.3 or newer.

    For information on installing or upgrading plugins, see Find plugins with the plugin catalog.

  • DoiT BigQuery plugin no longer supported – The DoiT BigQuery data source plugin is no longer supported. Use the official Grafana Labs BigQuery data source plugin instead.

  • Transformation changes – Grafana version 10 has made a few bug fix changes to field names and keys. For full details, see Transformation breaking changes in the Grafana Labs documentation.

  • Data source permissions APIs – The endpoints for accessing data source permissions have changed. For full details, see Data source permissions changes in the Grafana Labs documentation.

For more details on breaking changes, and changes that affect plugin developers, see the following topics in the Grafana Labs documentation:

Grafana version 9

The following features were added in Grafana v9.

  • Alerting: Grafana-managed alert rules now supports group names.

  • Explore: Create a dashboard from within Explore view.

  • Prometheus queries: A new query builder for Prometheus queries (using PromQL) makes writing queries easier.

  • Loki queries: A new query builder for Loki queries (using LogQL) makes writing queries easier.

  • API tokens / Service accounts: Service accounts simplify machine access in Grafana, helping you to manage API tokens.

  • Plugin management: You can enable plugin management to install, remove, or update community plugins in your workspace. This gives you access to more data sources and visualizations, and gives you control over the version of each plugin that you use.

  • Trace to metrics: Configure a tracing data source to add links to metrics with queries and tags.

  • Canvas panel: A new panel visualization with static and dynamic elements to create data-driven, custom panels with images and overlain text.

  • Reorganized interface: Updated UI with easier navigation in the Grafana console.

  • CloudWatch: The Amazon CloudWatch data source can now monitor metrics across AWS accounts and across AWS Regions.

  • Logs: The interface for log details has been improved.

  • General: Bug fixes and minor improvements throughout.

Breaking changes

The Grafana version 9.4 release includes a range of new features and improvements, building upon previous versions. This version had some changes that might break functionality in some cases. When updating to a new version, we recommend you test in a non-production environment before updating your production workspaces.

The following changes might affect some users updating to Grafana version 9.4. For a detailed list of these changes, see the Grafana 9.4 changelog on GitHub.

  • API discontinued – The /api/tsdb/query API has been removed.

    Action required: Use /api/ds/query instead. See Query a data source in the Grafana public documentation and Issue #49916 on GitHub.

  • API endpoint changes – Several alerting API endpoints now require data source UID instead of numeric ID.

    Affected endpoints: api/v1/rule/test, api/prometheus/, api/ruler/, api/alertmanager/

    Action required: Update API calls to use data source UID as path parameter. See Issues #48070, #48052, #48046, and #47978 on GitHub.

  • Azure Monitor queries removed – Application Insights and Insight Analytics queries are no longer supported.

    Deprecated in Grafana 8.0, removed in 9.0. Deprecated queries will not execute.

    Action required: See Azure Monitor data source in the Grafana public documentation for migration guidance.

  • Browser access mode removed – Browser access mode is no longer available for InfluxDB and Prometheus data sources.

    Action required: Switch to server access mode in your data source configuration. InfluxDB: Deprecated in 8.0.0, removed in 9.2.0. See Issue #53529 on GitHub. Prometheus: Deprecated in 7.4.0, removed in 9.2.0. See Issue #50162 on GitHub.

  • Dashboard settings access restricted – You can no longer open dashboard settings while editing panels.

    Dashboard settings are locked when panel edit mode is active. Close panel edit mode before accessing dashboard settings. See Issue #54746 on GitHub.

  • Data source password encryption – Unencrypted passwords are no longer supported.

    Action required: Use secureJsonData.password and secureJsonData.basicAuthPassword. Previously discontinued in v8.1.0. See Issue #49987 on GitHub.

  • Default data source behavior – Default data source selection no longer affects existing panels.

    Default data source only applies to new panels. Changing the default won't update existing dashboards. Previously saved panels retain their data source configuration. See Issue #45132 on GitHub.

  • Elasticsearch interval property changed – Query interval specification updated for Elasticsearch 7.x.

    Changed from interval to fixed_interval property. Provides consistency with Elasticsearch 8.x. Most queries won't show visible changes. See Issue #50297 on GitHub.

  • Elasticsearch Raw document mode discontinued – Display mode changes in Elasticsearch data source.

    Action required: Use Raw Data mode instead. See Issue #62236 on GitHub.

  • Elasticsearch version support – Older Elasticsearch versions are no longer supported.

    Action required: Upgrade Elasticsearch to version 7.10.0 or later. Versions below 7.10.0 are past end-of-life. See Issue #48715 on GitHub.

  • Explore URL format discontinued – Compact Explore URLs will be removed in a future release.

    Action required: Update hard coded links to use standard URL format. Compact URLs: &left=["now-1h","now"...]. Standard URLs: &left={"datasource":"test"...}. See Issue #50873 on GitHub.

  • GitHub OAuth display changes – GitHub name and login display updated.

    GitHub name appears as Grafana name. GitHub login appears as Grafana login. Improves user identification clarity. See Issue #45438 on GitHub.

  • Heatmap panel implementation updated – Heatmap panels use a new implementation starting in 9.1.0.

    Significantly improved rendering performance. Buckets are placed on reasonable borders (1m, 5m, 30s). Round cells are no longer supported.

    Action required: Test your heatmap panels after upgrade. Disable new implementation by setting useLegacyHeatmapPanel feature flag to true if needed. Add ?__feature.useLegacyHeatmapPanel=true to dashboard URLs for testing. See Issue #50229 on GitHub.

  • InfluxDB backend migration – InfluxDB data parsing behavior has changed.

    The InfluxDB backend migration feature toggle (influxdbBackendMigration) is reintroduced due to backend processing issues. By default, InfluxDB data is parsed in the frontend. If you upgraded to 9.4.4 and added transformations on InfluxDB data, those panels will fail to render.

    Action required: Remove affected panels and recreate them, or edit the time field as Time in panel.json or dashboard.json. See Issue #64842 on GitHub.

  • Log message format updated – Log message structure has changed.

    lvl is now level. eror and dbug are now error and debug. Increased timestamp precision. Opt-out available with oldlog feature toggle (temporary). See Issue #47584 on GitHub.

  • Loki data format optimization – Loki logs data uses a more efficient dataframe format.

    Single dataframe with labels column instead of separate dataframes. Explore and logs panels work without changes. Other panels or transforms may need adjustment.

    Action required: Replace labels to fields transformation with extract fields transformation. See Issue #47153 on GitHub.

  • NaN value handling – Consistent NaN representation across Prometheus and Loki data sources.

    NaN values remain as NaN instead of converting to null. Change should be mostly invisible to users. Affects both dashboard and alerting paths. See Issues #49475 and #45389 on GitHub.

  • Password reset links invalidated – Existing password reset links won't work after upgrade.

    Password reset links sent before upgrade are invalid. Users must request new password reset links. Links expire after 2 hours. See Issue #42334 on GitHub.

  • Reserved label prefix – Labels starting with grafana_ are reserved.

    Manually configured labels beginning with grafana_ may be overwritten. Current reserved labels: grafana_folder (Title of the folder containing the alert). See Issue #50262 on GitHub.

  • Transformation improvements – Rename by regex transformation now supports global patterns.

    Global patterns use the format /<stringToReplace>/g. Some transformations may behave differently. Wrap match strings in forward slashes for previous behavior: (.*) becomes /(.*)/. See Issue #48179 on GitHub.