Pulse Monitor vs Thanos
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted monitoring & status options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Thanos
Highly available Prometheus setup with long-term storage
| Feature | Pulse Monitor | Thanos |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 91 · Excellent | 94 · Excellent |
| Category | Monitoring & Status | Monitoring & Status |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | Go | Go |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 1,024 MB |
| Deployment | docker | docker, kubernetes, helm |
| GitHub stars | ★ 6,742 | ★ 14,214 |
| First released | 2024 | 2018 |
| Replaces | Datadog | Datadog, Grafana Cloud |
What are Pulse Monitor and Thanos?
Pulse Monitor
Pulse is a self-hosted monitoring application focused on Proxmox VE and PBS environments, surfacing node, VM, and backup health. It provides real-time dashboards and alerting.
- Proxmox monitoring
- VM and node health
- Backup status
- Real-time dashboards
Thanos
Thanos extends Prometheus with global query view, unlimited retention, and high availability. It uses object storage to keep metrics cheaply for years while presenting a single query endpoint across many Prometheus instances.
- Global query view
- Unlimited metric retention
- Object storage backend
- Downsampling for fast queries
Pulse Monitor vs Thanos: key differences
Both projects are written in Go. Licensing differs — MIT for Pulse Monitor versus Apache-2.0 for Thanos. Pulse Monitor is the lighter option, starting around 256 MB of RAM against 1,024 MB for Thanos. Thanos is the more established project (first released 2018), while Pulse Monitor arrived in 2024. Thanos has the considerably larger community, at 14,214 GitHub stars versus 6,742.
Why pick each one
Choose Pulse Monitor if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Mature project with 6.7k GitHub stars
Choose Thanos if…
- Scales Prometheus to massive deployments
- Cheap long-term storage
Watch out for
- Complex multi-component architecture
- Steep learning curve
Frequently asked questions
Is Pulse Monitor or Thanos better?
Neither is universally better. Thanos has the larger community, while Pulse Monitor is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Pulse Monitor and Thanos free and open-source?
Yes. Pulse Monitor is licensed under MIT and Thanos under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Pulse Monitor and Thanos with Docker?
Pulse Monitor: yes. Thanos: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Pulse Monitor or Thanos?
Pulse Monitor has the smaller minimum footprint at 256 MB of RAM, compared to about 1,024 MB for Thanos. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.