InfluxDB vs Telegraf

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?
FeatureInfluxDBTelegraf
CategoryMonitoring & StatusMonitoring & Status
LicenseMITMIT
LanguageRustGo
Setup difficultyMediumEasy
Min. RAM512 MB64 MB
Deploymentdocker, kubernetes, binarydocker, kubernetes, binary
GitHub stars★ 31,683★ 17,736
First released20132015
ReplacesDatadog, AWS TimestreamDatadog Agent

Why pick each one

Choose InfluxDB if…

  • Excellent for IoT and metrics
  • Rich tooling and integrations
InfluxDB details

Choose Telegraf if…

  • Huge plugin catalog
  • Trivial to deploy
Telegraf details

Frequently asked questions

Is InfluxDB or Telegraf better?

Neither is universally better. InfluxDB has the larger community, while Telegraf is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.

Are InfluxDB and Telegraf free and open-source?

Yes. InfluxDB is licensed under MIT and Telegraf under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run InfluxDB and Telegraf with Docker?

InfluxDB: yes. Telegraf: yes.

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