{"data":[{"slug":"grafana","name":"Grafana","tagline":"Dashboards for everything observable","category":"observability","url":"https://grafana.com","github":"https://github.com/grafana/grafana","pricing":"open-source","hook":"Grafana visualizes metrics from anywhere.","whatsGood":"Connects to every data source imaginable. Dashboard flexibility is unmatched. Alerting rules catch issues. The ecosystem of plugins extends capabilities.","theCatch":"Dashboard sprawl becomes a maintenance burden. Learning PromQL or LogQL takes time. Self-hosting requires infrastructure.","verdict":"The universal observability dashboard.","addedAt":"2026-08-19","featured":false,"domain":"Observability","subSpecialty":"Metrics","subcategory":"Metrics","tags":["self-host","copyleft","observability","active"],"capabilities":["dashboards","metrics"],"surfaces":["Self-host"],"ecosystem":["Multi-platform"],"licenseModel":"AGPL-3.0","githubStars":77358,"starsPerWeek":115,"access":"free","archived":false,"repo":{"createdAt":"2013-12-11","pushedAt":"2026-10-19","license":"AGPL-3.0","archived":false,"checkedAt":"2026-10-19"},"links":{"self":"/api/gems/grafana","html":"/gems/grafana","markdown":"/gems/grafana.md"}},{"slug":"prometheus","name":"Prometheus","tagline":"Time-series metrics for cloud-native","category":"observability","url":"https://prometheus.io","github":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus","pricing":"open-source","hook":"Prometheus is how you collect metrics at scale.","whatsGood":"Pull-based collection simplifies service discovery. PromQL enables powerful queries. The exporters ecosystem covers everything. CNCF graduated project means long-term support.","theCatch":"Single-node storage limits scale. PromQL has a learning curve. High cardinality labels cause problems.","verdict":"The foundation of cloud-native metrics.","addedAt":"2026-08-19","featured":false,"domain":"Observability","subSpecialty":"Metrics","subcategory":"Metrics","tags":["self-host","permissive","observability","active"],"capabilities":["metrics","promql"],"surfaces":["Self-host"],"ecosystem":["Multi-platform"],"licenseModel":"Apache-2.0","githubStars":66637,"starsPerWeek":92,"access":"free","archived":false,"repo":{"createdAt":"2012-11-24","pushedAt":"2026-10-19","license":"Apache-2.0","archived":false,"checkedAt":"2026-10-19"},"links":{"self":"/api/gems/prometheus","html":"/gems/prometheus","markdown":"/gems/prometheus.md"}},{"slug":"victoriametrics","name":"VictoriaMetrics","tagline":"Apache-2.0 Prom-compatible TSDB storage swap, not full APM UI","category":"observability","url":"https://victoriametrics.com","github":"https://github.com/VictoriaMetrics/VictoriaMetrics","pricing":"open-source","hook":"VictoriaMetrics is the Prometheus-compatible TSDB you swap in when Prom storage cost and cardinality hurt.","whatsGood":"Apache-2.0 Community. PromQL-ish queries, single-node and cluster, high ingest, drop-in remote_write target. Cheap long retention vs default Prometheus TSDB.","theCatch":"Storage/metrics engine - not Grafana/SigNoz APM UI. Downsampling, anomaly detection (vmanomaly), and advanced multi-tenant stats/rate-limit bits are Enterprise. Distinct from Prometheus encyclopedia and SigNoz all-in-one.","verdict":"Apache-2.0 Prom-compatible TSDB. CE free; downsampling/anomaly/multi-tenant Enterprise.","addedAt":"2026-09-07","featured":false,"domain":"Observability","subSpecialty":"Metrics","subcategory":"Metrics","tags":["self-host","permissive","observability","active"],"capabilities":["metrics","tsdb","prometheus"],"surfaces":["Self-host"],"ecosystem":["Go","Multi-platform"],"licenseModel":"Apache-2.0","githubStars":17882,"starsPerWeek":43,"access":"free","archived":false,"repo":{"createdAt":"2018-09-30","pushedAt":"2026-10-19","license":"Apache-2.0","archived":false,"checkedAt":"2026-10-19"},"links":{"self":"/api/gems/victoriametrics","html":"/gems/victoriametrics","markdown":"/gems/victoriametrics.md"}},{"slug":"beszel","name":"Beszel","tagline":"MIT lightweight server + Docker monitoring — PocketBase hub, tiny agents, alerts","category":"observability","url":"https://beszel.dev","github":"https://github.com/henrygd/beszel","pricing":"open-source","hook":"Beszel is a small self-hosted monitoring stack: a hub web app (built on PocketBase) plus a lightweight agent on each box, giving you CPU, memory, disk, network, temps, GPU, S.M.A.R.T. and per-container Docker/Podman history with alerts — without standing up Prometheus and Grafana.","whatsGood":"MIT (henrygd/beszel). Free path: run the hub and agent Docker images (or binaries) from the quick start at beszel.dev — no account, no SaaS. Tracks host and container metrics over time, ZFS pools, GPU usage (Nvidia, AMD, Intel), disk health with drive-failure alerts, and agent-side network checks. Multi-user with shared systems, OAuth/OIDC login (password auth can be switched off), and automatic backups to disk or S3-compatible storage. Useful when you run a handful of VPSes or a homelab and want history plus alerts in minutes. ★~26k.","theCatch":"Fixed set of host and container metrics, not a general metrics platform: no PromQL, no custom app metrics, no logs or traces. The hub is one PocketBase (SQLite) app, so think small fleets, not hundreds of nodes with long high-resolution retention. The agent needs host access (and the Docker/Podman socket for container stats), so scope it like any privileged daemon. Vs Uptime Kuma (endpoint uptime), Dozzle (container logs) and Prometheus + Grafana (full metrics stack): Beszel is the resource-history-and-alerts middle seat.","verdict":"MIT self-hosted server and container monitoring when Prometheus + Grafana is too much — free, quick to run, but a fixed metric set on a single-hub design.","addedAt":"2026-10-06","featured":false,"domain":"Observability","subSpecialty":"Metrics","subcategory":"Metrics","tags":["self-host","permissive","containers","observability","active"],"capabilities":["monitoring","docker","alerts"],"surfaces":["Self-host","Hosted"],"ecosystem":["Go","Multi-platform"],"licenseModel":"OSS/MIT","githubStars":26329,"starsPerWeek":221,"access":"free","archived":false,"repo":{"createdAt":"2024-07-07","pushedAt":"2026-10-18","license":"MIT","archived":false,"checkedAt":"2026-10-19"},"links":{"self":"/api/gems/beszel","html":"/gems/beszel","markdown":"/gems/beszel.md"}},{"slug":"node-exporter","name":"node_exporter","tagline":"Apache-2.0 official Prometheus host-metrics exporter","category":"observability","url":"https://prometheus.io/docs/guides/node-exporter/","github":"https://github.com/prometheus/node_exporter","pricing":"open-source","hook":"node_exporter is the Prometheus project's own agent for machine metrics: run it on a Linux or *NIX host and it serves CPU, memory, disk, filesystem and network metrics on port 9100 for Prometheus to scrape.","whatsGood":"Apache-2.0 (prometheus/node_exporter), release v1.12.1, maintained since 2013. A single Go binary with pluggable collectors you can switch on or off with flags, packaged in EPEL, available as an Ansible role and as a container image. It is the data source behind most standard Linux host dashboards. ★~13.8k.","theCatch":"It only exposes metrics: you still need a Prometheus server (or a compatible scraper) to store them and something like Grafana to view and alert on them. Running it in a container needs host networking, the host PID namespace and a read-only bind mount of / with --path.rootfs, or it ends up measuring the container instead of the machine. Windows needs the separate windows_exporter, and NVIDIA GPUs need dcgm-exporter.","verdict":"The first thing to install on any Linux box you want to watch with Prometheus.","addedAt":"2026-10-17","featured":false,"domain":"Observability","subSpecialty":"Metrics","subcategory":"Metrics","tags":["self-host","permissive","scraping","observability","active"],"capabilities":["metrics","prometheus","host"],"surfaces":["Self-host"],"ecosystem":["Go"],"licenseModel":"Apache-2.0","githubStars":13858,"starsPerWeek":20,"access":"free","archived":false,"repo":{"createdAt":"2013-04-18","pushedAt":"2026-10-15","license":"Apache-2.0","archived":false,"checkedAt":"2026-10-19"},"links":{"self":"/api/gems/node-exporter","html":"/gems/node-exporter","markdown":"/gems/node-exporter.md"}},{"slug":"datadog","name":"Datadog","tagline":"Unified observability platform","category":"observability","url":"https://datadoghq.com","github":null,"pricing":"paid","hook":"Datadog is the observability platform with everything.","whatsGood":"Logs, metrics, traces, and APM in one platform. The integrations list is massive. ML-powered anomaly detection helps. The UI is polished.","theCatch":"Expensive at scale—costs surprise teams. Vendor lock-in is significant. Feature creep makes the platform complex.","verdict":"The everything platform—if you can afford it.","addedAt":"2026-08-19","featured":false,"domain":"Observability","subSpecialty":"Metrics","subcategory":"Metrics","tags":["paid-only","observability"],"capabilities":["apm","metrics"],"surfaces":["Hosted"],"ecosystem":["Multi-platform"],"licenseModel":"Paid","githubStars":null,"starsPerWeek":null,"access":"paid-led","archived":false,"repo":null,"links":{"self":"/api/gems/datadog","html":"/gems/datadog","markdown":"/gems/datadog.md"}}],"meta":{"total":6,"count":6,"offset":0,"limit":null,"sort":"curated","sorts":["curated","catalog","new","stars","trending","name"],"filters":{"subcategory":"metrics"},"next":null,"categories":["agents","nextjs","python","shopify","databases","devops","design","observability","rust","payments","comms","notifications","libraries"],"tags":["mcp","cli","tui","api","sdk","desktop-app","web-ui","editor-plugin","self-host","local-first","free-tier","paid-only","paid-led","permissive","copyleft","source-available","license-unclear","coding-agents","local-llm","rag","memory","evals","browser-automation","scraping","sandbox","skills","voice","security","auth","payments","realtime","postgres","vector","kubernetes","containers","observability","testing","workflows","graphics-3d","git","active","stale","archived","young-repo","fast-stars"]}}