Glances vs Kapacitor

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted monitoring & status options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
FeatureGlancesKapacitor
CategoryMonitoring & StatusMonitoring & Status
LicenseLGPL-3.0MIT
LanguagePythonGo
Setup difficultyEasyMedium
Min. RAM128 MB512 MB
Deploymentdocker, bare-metal, binarydocker, bare-metal, binary
GitHub stars★ 33,269★ 2,373
First released20122015
ReplacesDatadogDatadog Monitors, Splunk ITSI

Why pick each one

Choose Glances if…

  • Very easy to run
  • Lightweight
  • Good single-host overview
Glances details

Choose Kapacitor if…

  • Tight InfluxDB integration
  • Flexible alert routing
Kapacitor details

Frequently asked questions

Is Glances or Kapacitor better?

Glances is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler easy setup. Consider Kapacitor if its specific feature set fits your needs better.

Are Glances and Kapacitor free and open-source?

Yes. Glances is licensed under LGPL-3.0 and Kapacitor under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Glances and Kapacitor with Docker?

Glances: yes. Kapacitor: yes.

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