Using Grafana for IoT: Benefits, Challenges, and Best Practices

In 2025, over 55 billion connected IoT devices will generate staggering 80 zettabytes of data. As an Internet of Things enthusiast, you know firsthand how challenging it is to manage large-scale datasets. But fear not; leveraging Grafana for IoT is a viable solution.

Make sense of all your IoT data and boost your work efficiency with the help of Grafana — the ultimate data visualization and analytics tool. In this article, we’ll explore the benefits of this platform even further and tell you how to use it to your advantage.

At WebbyLab, we use Grafana in all our IoT projects and have witnessed its data monitoring and analysis efficiency. So, whether you’re new to this tool or want to learn more about its uses, keep reading this post.

What Are the Benefits of Grafana in IoT?

Grafana plays a crucial role in IoT by providing robust data visualization and analysis capabilities, enabling businesses to gain deeper insights into their IoT devices’ performance and behavior. Here are some of the primary benefits of using Grafana for IoT:

Data Analysis

Grafana software data visualization system allows users to analyze large amounts of IoT data quickly and effortlessly. Its intuitive interface and advanced querying capabilities make it easy to identify patterns and trends and perform complex analyses to uncover hidden insights.

Performance Tracking

Grafana IoT dashboard also helps users monitor their connected devices’ real-time performance. As a result, they can quickly identify and address operation and functionality issues, improving overall device efficiency and reliability.

Troubleshooting

With the Grafana dashboard, it’s easy to troubleshoot any IoT device issues. This tool provides detailed metrics and logs, so users can swiftly identify the occurring problems’ root causes and take appropriate measures.

Data Gathering

This tool can collect and monitoring data from various IoT devices like sensors, gateways, and other endpoints and store it in the Grafana database. Users may then leverage this platform’s robust features to analyze and visualize the gathered datasets.

These are just a few benefits users can get from leveraging Grafana for IoT. Overall, it is a reliable tool that can optimize business operations and streamline IoT data collection and analysis.

The Challenges Businesses Face with IoT Monitoring

As we’ve mentioned earlier, managing massive datasets from IoT devices is not an easy task. Businesses face several more associated challenges when monitoring their IoT systems. Here are the most common ones:

• Speed

IoT monitoring necessitates processing and analyzing vast amounts of data as fast as possible. Since closing performance gaps is time-sensitive, businesses must respond quickly to ensure optimal device operation. It can be challenging, especially on a large scale, where monitoring multiple IoT devices can become overwhelming.

• Security

Each additional IoT hardware or software component integrated into a company’s IoT ecosystem adds a new security liability. Thus, businesses must cover their IoT infrastructure and take care of the proper security measures.

• Scalability

As the number of IoT devices in a business’s ecosystem grows exponentially, companies must keep up with the demand for IoT monitoring. That is, they need to scale their capabilities for data collection, processing, and analysis.

• Integration

Integrating new IoT devices into an existing ecosystem can be challenging, especially considering compatibility and interoperability. Ensuring all gadgets can communicate and seamlessly share data and IoT software systems is essential for effective IoT device monitoring.

Businesses must prepare for potential IoT monitoring challenges in advance. The good news is that implementing the Grafana IoT monitoring dashboard can solve the above concerns.

Grafana in IoT: Best Practices

Now that you know everything about the benefits and challenges of Grafana and IoT monitoring, let’s get to the Grafana IoT best practices. WebbyLab leverages this data analysis and visualization tool extensively, as it helps to tackle all data-related tasks.

Here’s a look at what our team has done with Grafana for IoT devices:

1. Developing and configuring a system for monitoring all WebbyLab platforms’ infrastructure

As developers and the IoT support team, WebbyLab experts use Grafana-based monitoring in every project. With this tool, we monitor server health, load, docker containers, and more.

We also developed and used a standard monitoring system template on each platform, such as the Propuskator IoT-powered access control and management system. Typically, we leverage Grafana as a data visualization tool and collect the data using Prometheus.

Monitoring docker containers through the Grafana web app.

2. Developing an alerting system

Our experts also have experience setting up an alerting system in case of failures or problems using Prometheus and Grafana. We have created a platform thanks to which support teams receive instant notifications in Slack, Telegram, or e-mail if any issues occur. In addition, the alerting system notifies not only about problems but also about events and their solutions.

Using Grafana for developing an alerting system.

3. Developing tailored systems for monitoring business metrics

The question of monitoring business metrics arises for every product at some point. It can start with registered users, user activity, platform usage statistics, etc.

We use Grafana as a business metrics visualization tool for our projects. Information is obtained from our database and displayed in a convenient aggregated format. We tailor each system according to the metrics of an individual project.

Leveraging Grafana for business monitoring and viewing the 2Smart platform statistics.

In addition, we also deliver white-label instances of business metrics monitoring platforms. For example, in private installations of the Propuskator access control and management system, our client can use monitoring to control their customers — distributors of the system. In another project, 2Smart Cloud, monitoring includes helpful information on users and their platform usage statistics.

4. Developing a tool for visualizing historical data

All IoT platforms have a requirement to collect and visualize data from devices. Our projects are no exception. We implemented our solution for gathering data from devices in real-time and storing this information in the InfluxDb time series database.

By connecting Grafana to InfluxDb as a data source, we could display large amounts of information on graphs and other Grafana widgets. Thus, our team received tools for building dashboards for monitoring changes in temperature, humidity, and various digital values on charts. All this data is analyzed through the Grafana web application.

Visualizing historical data through the Grafana web application.

On top of that, due to Grafana’s large community, there are always new dashboards that can be easily utilized. For example, in our 2Smart Standalone platform, users can independently install Grafana from the market and configure the dashboards they require. Also, Grafana has a lot of convenient filters and sorting that expand the user’s capabilities.

5. Increasing our clients’ products’ value

We also have experience increasing the value of our clients’ products through implementing Grafana. This technology benefits projects in various ways. In particular, these are the already mentioned monitoring and alerting capabilities and reporting features the platform offers. For example, in the business mode of the 2Smart Cloud platform, Grafana is available as a standard tool for sysadmins and support teams.

6. Integrating Grafana with other tools

Since Grafana works well with other tools and platforms, the WebbyLab team often leverages this benefit. We combine it with data storage systems, analytics software, and messaging apps for improved IoT data management and analysis.

7. Using Grafana for inspiration

Finally, we use Grafana in IoT for inspiration. This tool is a ‘role model’ for us when it comes to the high-quality display of data on graphs, tables, and so on.

Start Using Grafana in IoT Projects Today

Grafana has become an essential tool for IoT monitoring and analysis, allowing businesses to gain practical insights from immense amounts of data generated by IoT devices. This tool is a game-changer in the Internet of Things systems by providing real-time performance tracking, customizable dashboards, and advanced analytics.

If you want to implement Grafana for IoT to facilitate your decision-making and improve performance, WebbyLab is ready to help. Since we use this tool in every project, we have the necessary knowledge to ensure your IoT infrastructure performs well. We consider it our responsibility to take your project to new heights, so contact us anytime to discuss your innovative solution.