Datadog vs Grafana Cloud

Datadog vs Grafana Cloud

Neither is better for everyone. Datadog suits teams running multiple hosts that want one platform across infrastructure, APM and logs; per-host pricing makes it harder to estimate for very small apps. Grafana Cloud suits teams that already use Grafana dashboards or open-source Prometheus and Loki.

Datadog vs Grafana Cloud at a glance

This page compares Datadog and Grafana Cloud using only what the sources below say about each. Where one is the better pick for a situation, we say which and why.

We read each source on 2026-11-05. Prices and limits change often, so confirm on the vendor's own page before you buy. A figure marked "one source only" was not matched by a second publisher.

When to pick each one

Pick Datadog if it matches your situation

Choose Datadog over Grafana Cloud for teams running multiple hosts that want one platform across infrastructure, APM and logs; per-host pricing makes it harder to estimate for very small apps.

What the sources say about Datadog:

• The pricing page lists Infrastructure Pro at $15 per host per month billed annually, or $18 on demand.^[1]
• The pricing page lists APM at $31 per host per month with Infrastructure Monitoring attached (billed annually), and its FAQ gives standalone prices of $36 for APM, $41 for APM Pro and $47 for APM Enterprise.^[1]
• The APM billing documentation lists $31 per underlying APM host per month and $35 for APM Pro.^[3]

Pick Grafana Cloud if it matches your situation

Choose Grafana Cloud over Datadog for teams that already use Grafana dashboards or open-source Prometheus and Loki.

Limits and things to check

Datadog

• Per a third-party summary, every billable APM host requires Pro or Enterprise Infrastructure Monitoring, so a traced host costs roughly $46 per month on the Pro path.^[4] One source only.
• Per a third-party summary, hosts are counted at the peak for the month after discarding the top 1 percent of hours.^[4] One source only.

Grafana Cloud

• The free tier is limited to 10k active series per month with 14 days retention, and 50 GB of logs ingested per month with 14 days retention.^[2]
• A Grafana community forum post says usage exceeding the Free plan ingestion limits will be discarded.^[5]
• Several third-party sites list 3 users on the free tier; this was not found on Grafana's own page in these results.^[6] One source only.

Pricing as reported

Datadog

Pricing as reported for Datadog:

• Infrastructure Free: $0 (5 hosts, 1-day retention (third-party reported)) ^[4] One source only, so confirm it on the vendor page.
• Infrastructure Pro: $15 per host per month billed annually; $18 on demand (Per host, per month) ^[1]
• APM (with Infrastructure attached): $31 per host per month billed annually; $36 on demand (Requires Infrastructure Monitoring on the host; standalone APM is $36 per host per month billed annually) ^[1]

Grafana Cloud

Pricing as reported for Grafana Cloud:

• Free: $0 (10k active series per month, 50 GB logs ingested per month, 14-day retention) ^[2]

Where Continuum fits

We make Continuum Keep it running. Weigh what we say here with that in mind. The tools above are the better choice when you want software you run yourself; ours is the better choice when you want a person to do or read the work.

Continuum Keep it running (ours)

A monthly retainer where a person handles monitoring, security and dependency patching, and incident triage for an app.^[7]

What our own page says:

• It is a service with a person in the loop, not a self-serve monitoring product.^[7]

Limits and things to check:

• It does not replace an error tracker or uptime tool you want to read yourself.^[7]

Pricing as reported for Continuum Keep it running:

• Keep it running: $500/mo (Keep-alive level) ^[7]

Suits a founder who wants someone else to watch the app and respond when it breaks.

Details on Continuum Keep it running.

Know what breaks first

Straight answers