Chronograf vs Cube
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted dashboards & startpages options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Chronograf
Visualization and admin interface for the InfluxData stack
VS
Cube
Semantic layer and headless BI for building data apps
| Feature | Chronograf | Cube |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Dashboards & Startpages | Dashboards & Startpages |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | TypeScript | Rust |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 512 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal, binary | docker, kubernetes, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,566 | ★ 20,572 |
| First released | 2016 | 2019 |
| Replaces | Grafana Cloud, Datadog Dashboards | Looker, AtScale |
Why pick each one
Frequently asked questions
Is Chronograf or Cube better?
Neither is universally better. Cube has the larger community, while Chronograf is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Chronograf and Cube free and open-source?
Yes. Chronograf is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and Cube under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Chronograf and Cube with Docker?
Chronograf: yes. Cube: yes.