Dashboards on Grafana Labs

Dashboard UI

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Working with Grafana dashboard UI

The dashboard UI has the following sections to allow you to customize the presentation of data.

Zoom out time range (1)
Time picker dropdown (2). Access relative time range options, auto refresh options and set custom absolute time ranges.
Manual refresh option (3) Fetch new data.
Dashboard panel (4) Click the panel title to edit panels.
Graph legend (5) Change series colors, y-axis and series visibility directly from the legend.

For more details, see Dashboard header and Dashboard rows.

Dashboard Folders

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Dashboard Folders

Folders are a way to organize and group dashboards - very useful if you have a lot of dashboards or multiple teams using the same Grafana instance.

Note: Only Grafana Admins and Super Admins can create, edit, or delete folders. Refer to Organization roles for more information.

How To Create A Folder

Create a folder by using the Create Folder link in the side menu (under the create menu (+ icon))
Use the create Folder button on the Manage Dashboards page.
When saving a dashboard, you can either choose a folder for the dashboard to be saved in or create a new folder

On the Create Folder page, fill in a unique name for the folder and then click Create.

Manage Dashboards

There is a new Manage Dashboards page where you can carry out a variety of tasks:

create a folder
create a dashboard
move dashboards into folders
delete multiple dashboards
navigate to a folder page (where you can set permissions for a folder and/or its dashboards)

Dashboard Folder Page

You reach the dashboard folder page by clicking on the cog icon that appears when you hover over a folder in the dashboard list in the search result or on the Manage dashboards page.

The Dashboard Folder Page is similar to the Manage Dashboards page and is where you can carry out the following tasks:

Allows you to move or delete dashboards in a folder.
Rename a folder (under the Settings tab).
Set permissions for the folder (inherited by dashboards in the folder).

Permissions

Permissions can be assigned to a folder and inherited by the containing dashboards. An Access Control List (ACL) is used where Organization Role, Team and Individual User can be assigned permissions. Read the Dashboard and Folder Permissions docs for more detail on the permission system.

Create dashboards

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Create dashboard

To create a new dashboard:

Click the new dashboard link on the right side of the time picker. A blank dashboard is created.

Manage dashboards

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Manage dashboards

When managing dashboads, you can use:

Select a time period for a dashboard using the Time range controls in the upper right of the dashboard.
Tag dashboards.
Use templating to make them more dynamic and interactive.
Use annotations to display event data across panels. This can help correlate the time series data in the panel with other events.
Use the dashboard picker for quick, searchable access to all dashboards in a particular organization.

You can also share dashboards in a variety of ways.

Annotations

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Annotations

Annotations provide a way to mark points on the graph with rich events. When you hover over an annotation you can get event description and event tags. The text field can include links to other systems with more detail.

Native annotations

Grafana comes with a native annotation store and the ability to add annotation events directly from the graph panel or via the HTTP API.

Adding annotations

By holding down Ctrl/Cmd+Click. Adding tags to the annotation will make it searchable from other dashboards.

Adding regions events

You can also hold down Ctrl/Cmd and select region to create a region annotation.

Built-in query

After you added an annotation they will still be visible. This is due to the built in annotation query that exists on all dashboards. This annotation query will fetch all annotation events that originate from the current dashboard and show them on the panel where they were created. This includes alert state history annotations. You can stop annotations from being fetched and drawn by opening the Annotations settings (via Dashboard cogs menu) and modifying the query named Annotations & Alerts (Built-in).

When you copy a dashboard using the Save As feature it will get a new dashboard id so annotations created on source dashboard will no longer be visible on the copy. You can still show them if you add a new Annotation Query and filter by tags. But this only works if the annotations on the source dashboard had tags to filter by.

Query by tag

You can create new queries to fetch annotations from the native annotation store via the -- Grafana -- data source by setting Filter by to Tags.

Grafana v8.1 and later versions also support typeahead of existing tags, provide at least one tag.

For example, create an annotation query name outages and specify a tag outage. This query will show all annotations (from any dashboard or via API) with the outage tag. If multiple tags are defined in an annotation query, then Grafana will only show annotations matching all the tags. To modify the behavior, enable Match any, and Grafana will show annotations that contain any one of the tags you provided.

In Grafana v5.3+ it’s possible to use template variables in the tag query. So if you have a dashboard showing stats for different services and a template variable that dictates which services to show, you can now use the same template variable in your annotation query to only show annotations for those services.

Querying other data sources

Annotation events are fetched via annotation queries. To add a new annotation query to a dashboard open the dashboard settings menu, then select Annotations. This will open the dashboard annotations settings view. To create a new annotation query hit the New button.

Specify a name for the annotation query. This name is given to the toggle (checkbox) that will allow you to enable/disable showing annotation events from this query. For example you might have two annotation queries named Deploys and Outages. The toggle will allow you to decide what annotations to show.

Annotation query details

The annotation query options are different for each data source. For information about annotations in a specific data source, refer to the specific data source topic.

Playlist

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Playlist

A playlist displays a list of dashboards that are in a sequence. Use a playlist to build situational awareness or to present your metrics to your team or visitors. Grafana automatically scales dashboards to any resolution, which makes them perfect for big screens. This topic has the following sections:

Playlist

Use the information in this section to access existing playlists. Start and control the display of a playlist using one of the five available modes.

Access playlist

Hover your cursor over Grafana’s side menu.
Click Playlists. You will see a list of existing playlists.

Start a playlist

Access the playlist page to see a list of existing playlists.
Find the playlist you want to start, then click Start playlist. The start playlist dialog opens.
Select one of the five playlist modes available based on the information in the following table.
Click Start .

The playlist displays each dashboard for the time specified in the Interval field, set when creating or editing a playlist. Once a playlist starts, you can control it using the navbar at the top of your screen.

Mode	Description
Normal mode	The side menu remains visible. The navbar, row, and panel controls appear at the top of the screen.
TV mode	The side menu and dashboard submenu (including variable drop-downs and dashboard links) are hidden or removed. The navbar, row, and panel controls appear at the top of the screen. Enabled automatically after one minute of user inactivity. Enable it manually using the `d v` sequence shortcut, or by appending the parameter `?inactive` to the dashboard URL. Disable it with any mouse movement or keyboard action.
TV mode (with auto fit panels)	The side menu and dashboard submenu (including variable drop-downs and dashboard links) are hidden or removed. The navbar, row and panel controls appear at the top of the screen. Dashboard panels automatically adjust to optimize space on screen.
Kiosk mode	The side menu, navbar, ro and panel controls are completely hidden/removed from view. You can enable it manually using the `d v` sequence shortcut after the playlist has started. You can disable it manually with the same shortcut.
Kiosk mode (with auto fit panels)	The side menu, navbar, row, and panel controls are completely hidden/removed from view. Dashboard panels automatically adjust to optimize space on screen.

Control a playlist

You can control a playlist in Normal or TV mode after it’s started, using the navigation bar at the top of your screen. Press the Esc key in your keyboard to stop the playlist.

Button	Result
Next (double-right arrow)	Advances to the next dashboard.
Back (left arrow)	Returns to the previous dashboard.
Stop (square)	Ends the playlist, and exits to the current dashboard.
Cycle view mode (monitor icon)	Rotates the display of the dashboards in different view modes.
Time range	Displays data within a time range. It can be set to display the last 5 minutes up to 5 years ago, or a custom time range, using the down arrow.
Refresh (circle arrow)	Reloads the dashboard, to display the current data. It can be set to reload automatically every 5 seconds to 1 day, using the drop-down arrow.

Create a playlist

You can create a playlist to present dashboards in a sequence, with a set order and time interval between dashboards.

In the playlist page, click New playlist. The New playlist page opens.
In the Name text box, enter a descriptive name.
In the Interval text box, enter a time interval. Grafana displays a particular dashboard for the interval of time specified here before moving on to the next dashboard.
In Dashboards, add existing dashboards to the playlist using Add by title and Add by tag drop-down options. The dashboards you add are listed in a sequential order.
If needed:
- Search for a dashboard by its name, a regular expression, or a tag.
- Filter your results by starred status or tags.
If needed, rearrange the order of the dashboard you have added using the up and down arrow icon.
Optionally, remove a dashboard from the playlist by clicking the x icon beside dashboard.
Click Save.

Edit or delete a playlist

You can edit a playlist by updating its name, interval time, and by adding, removing, and rearranging the order of dashboards. On the rare occasion when you no longer need a playlist, you can delete it.

Edit a playlist

In the playlist page, click Edit playlist. The Edit playlist page opens.
Update the name and time interval, then add or remove dashboards from the playlist using instructions in Create a playlist.
Click Save to save your changes.

Delete a playlist

In the playlist page, click Edit playlist. A prompts opens asking you to confirm the action.
Click delete.

You can share a playlist by copying the link address on the view mode you prefer, and pasting the URL to your destination.

From the Dashboards submenu, click Playlists.
Next to the playlist you want to share, click Start playlist.
In the dropdown, right click the view mode you prefer.
Click Copy Link Address to copy the URL to your clipboard.
```
Example: The URL for the first playlist on the Grafana Play site in Kiosk mode will look like this:
```
https://play.grafana.org/playlists/play/1?kiosk.
Paste the URL to your destination.

Search

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Dashboard Search

Dashboards can be searched by the dashboard name, filtered by one (or many) tags or filtered by starred status. The dashboard search is accessed through the dashboard picker, available in the dashboard top nav area. The dashboard search can also be opened by using the shortcut F.

Search Bar: The search bar allows you to enter any string and search both database and file based dashboards in real-time.
Starred: Here you find all your starred dashboards.
Recent: Here you find the latest created dashboards.
Folders: The tags filter allows you to filter the list by dashboard tags.
Root: The root contains all dashboards that are not placed in a folder.
Tags: The tags filter allows you to filter the list by dashboard tags.

When using only a keyboard, you can use your keyboard arrow keys to navigate the results, hit enter to open the selected dashboard.

Find by dashboard name

Begin typing any part of the desired dashboard names in the search bar. Search will return results for any partial string match in real-time, as you type.

Dashboard search is:

Real-time
Not case sensitive
Functional across stored and file based dashboards.

Filter by Tag(s)

Tags are a great way to organize your dashboards, especially as the number of dashboards grow. Tags can be added and managed in the dashboard Settings.

To filter the dashboard list by tag, click on any tag appearing in the right column. The list may be further filtered by clicking on additional tags:

Alternately, to see a list of all available tags, click the tags dropdown menu. All tags will be shown, and when a tag is selected, the dashboard search will be instantly filtered:

When using only a keyboard: tab to focus on the tags link, ▼ down arrow key to find a tag and select with the Enter key.

Note: When multiple tags are selected, Grafana will show dashboards that include all.

Keyboard shortcuts

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Keyboard shortcuts

Grafana has a number of keyboard shortcuts available. Press ? or h on your keyboard to display all keyboard shortcuts available in your version of Grafana.

Popular shortcuts:

Ctrl+S saves the current dashboard.
Ctrl+F opens the dashboard finder / search.
Ctrl+H hides all controls (good for tv displays).
Press Escape to exit graph when in fullscreen or edit mode.

Reporting

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Reporting

Reporting allows you to generate PDFs from any of your dashboards and have them sent out to interested parties on a schedule.

Reporting is only available in Grafana Enterprise, v6.4 or later. For more information, refer to Reporting in Grafana Enterprise.

Time range controls

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Time range controls

Grafana provides several ways to manage the time ranges of the data being visualized, for dashboard, panels and also for alerting.

This page describes supported time units and relative ranges, the common time controls, dashboard-wide time settings, and panel-specific time settings.

Time units and relative ranges

The following time units are supported: s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours), d (days), w (weeks), M (months), Q (quarters) and y (years).

The minus operator allows you to step back in time, relative to now. If you wish to display the full period of the unit (day, week, month, etc…), append /<time unit> to the end. To view fiscal periods, use fQ (fiscal quarter) and fy (fiscal year) time units.

The plus operator allows you to step forward in time relative to now. You might use this feature to look at predicted data in the future, for example.

Here are some examples:

Example relative range	From:	To:
Last 5 minutes	`now-5m`	`now`
The day so far	`now/d`	`now`
This week	`now/w`	`now/w`
This week so far	`now/w`	`now`
This month	`now/M`	`now/M`
This month so far	`now/M`	`now`
Previous Month	`now-1M/M`	`now-1M/M`
This year so far	`now/Y`	`now`
This Year	`now/Y`	`now/Y`
Previous fiscal year	`now-1y/fy`	`now-1y/fy`

Note about Grafana alerting

For Grafana alerting, we do not support the following syntaxes at this time.

now+n for future timestamps.
now-1n/n for “start of n until end of n” since this is an absolute timestamp.

Common time range controls

The dashboard and panel time controls have a common user interface (UI).

The options are defined below.

Current time range

The current time range, also called the time picker, shows the time range currently displayed in the dashboard or panel you are viewing.

Hover your cursor over the field to see the exact time stamps in the range and their source (such as the local browser).

Click on the current time range to change the time range. You can change the current time using a relative time range, such as the last 15 minutes, or an absolute time range, such as 2020-05-14 00:00:00 to 2020-05-15 23:59:59.

Relative time range

Select the relative time range from the Relative time ranges list. You can filter the list using the input field at the top. Some examples of time ranges are:

Last 30 minutes
Last 12 hours
Last 7 days
Last 2 years
Yesterday
Day before yesterday
This day last week
Today so far
This week so far
This month so far

Absolute time range

Set an absolute time range one of two ways:

Type values into the From and To fields. You can type exact time values or relative values, such as now-24h, and then click Apply time range.
Click in the From or To field. Grafana displays a calendar. Click the day or days you want to use as the current time range and then click Apply time range.

This section also displays recently used absolute ranges.

Zoom out (Cmd+Z or Ctrl+Z)

Click the Zoom out icon to view a larger time range in the dashboard or panel visualization.

Zoom in (only applicable to graph visualizations)

Click and drag to select the time range in the visualization that you want to view.

Refresh dashboard

Click the Refresh dashboard icon to immediately run every query on the dashboard and refresh the visualizations. Grafana cancels any pending requests when a new refresh is triggered.

By default, Grafana does not automatically refresh the dashboard. Queries run on their own schedule according to the panel settings. However, if you want to regularly refresh the dashboard, then click the down arrow next to the Refresh dashboard icon and then select a refresh interval.

Dashboard time settings

Time settings are saved on a per-dashboard basis.

You can change the Timezone and fiscal year settings from the time range controls by clicking the Change time settings button.

For more advanced time settings, click the Dashboard settings (gear) icon at the top of the UI. Then navigate to the Time Options section of the General tab.

Timezone - Specify the local time zone of the service or system that you are monitoring. This can be helpful when monitoring a system or service that operates across several time zones.
- Default - The default selected time zone for the user profile, team, or organization is used. If no time zone is specified for the user profile, a team the user is a member of, or the organization, then Grafana uses local browser time.
- Local browser time - The time zone configured for the viewing user browser is used. This is usually the same time zone as set on the computer.
- Standard ISO 8601 time zones, including UTC.
Auto-refresh - Customize the options displayed for relative time and the auto-refresh options. Entries are comma separated and accept any valid time unit.
Now delay - Override the now time by entering a time delay. Use this option to accommodate known delays in data aggregation to avoid null values.
Hide time picker - Select this option if you do not want Grafana to display the time picker.

Panel time overrides and timeshift

In Query options, you can override the relative time range for individual panels, causing them to be different than what is selected in the dashboard time picker in the upper right. This allows you to show metrics from different time periods or days at the same time.

Note: Panel time overrides have no effect when the time range for the dashboard is absolute.

Control the time range using a URL

Time range of a dashboard can be controlled by providing following query parameters in the dashboard URL:

from - defines lower limit of the time range, specified in ms epoch or relative time
to - defines upper limit of the time range, specified in ms epoch or relative time
time and time.window - defines a time range from time-time.window/2 to time+time.window/2. Both params should be specified in ms. For example ?time=1500000000000&time.window=10000 will result in 10s time range from 1499999995000 to 1500000005000

Dashboard version history

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Dashboard version history

Whenever you save a version of your dashboard, a copy of that version is saved so that previous versions of your dashboard are never lost. A list of these versions is available by entering the dashboard settings and then selecting “Versions” in the left side menu.

The dashboard version history feature lets you compare and restore to previously saved dashboard versions.

Comparing two dashboard versions

To compare two dashboard versions, select the two versions from the list that you wish to compare. Once selected, the “Compare versions” button will become clickable. Click the button to view the diff between the two versions.

Upon clicking the button, you’ll be brought to the diff view. By default, you’ll see a textual summary of the changes, like in the image below.

If you want to view the diff of the raw JSON that represents your dashboard, you can do that as well by clicking the “View JSON Diff” button at the bottom.

If you want to restore to the version you are diffing against, you can do so by clicking the “Restore to version <x>” button in the top right.

Restoring to a previously saved dashboard version

If you need to restore to a previously saved dashboard version, you can do so by either clicking the “Restore” button on the right of a row in the dashboard version list, or by clicking the “Restore to version <x>” button appearing in the diff view. Clicking the button will bring up the following popup prompting you to confirm the restoration.

After restoring to a previous version, a new version will be created containing the same exact data as the previous version, only with a different version number. This is indicated in the “Notes column” for the row in the new dashboard version. This is done simply to ensure your previous dashboard versions are not affected by the change.

Export and import

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Export and import

Grafana Dashboards can easily be exported and imported, either from the UI or from the HTTP API.

Exporting a dashboard

Dashboards are exported in Grafana JSON format, and contain everything you need (layout, variables, styles, data sources, queries, etc) to import the dashboard at a later time.

The export feature is accessed in the share window which you open by clicking the share button in the dashboard menu.

Making a dashboard portable

If you want to export a dashboard for others to use then it could be a good idea to add template variables for things like a metric prefix (use constant variable) and server name.

A template variable of the type Constant will automatically be hidden in the dashboard, and will also be added as a required input when the dashboard is imported.

Import dashboard

To import a dashboard click the + icon in the side menu, and then click Import.

From here you can upload a dashboard JSON file, paste a Grafana.com dashboard URL or paste dashboard JSON text directly into the text area.

In step 2 of the import process Grafana will let you change the name of the dashboard, pick what data source you want the dashboard to use and specify any metric prefixes (if the dashboard use any).

Discover dashboards on Grafana.com

Find dashboards for common server applications at Grafana.com/dashboards.

Dashboards on Grafana.com use a new feature in Grafana 3.1 that allows the import process to update each panel so that they are using a data source of your choice. If you are running a Grafana version older than 3.1 then you might need to do some manual steps either before or after import in order for the dashboard to work properly.

Dashboards exported from Grafana 3.1+ have a new json section __inputs that define what data sources and metric prefixes the dashboard uses.

Example:

{
  "__inputs": [
    {
      "name": "DS_GRAPHITE",
      "label": "graphite",
      "description": "",
      "type": "datasource",
      "pluginId": "graphite",
      "pluginName": "Graphite"
    },
    {
      "name": "VAR_PREFIX",
      "type": "constant",
      "label": "prefix",
      "value": "collectd",
      "description": ""
    }
  ]
}

These are then referenced in the dashboard panels like this:

{
  "rows": [
    {
      "panels": [
        {
          "type": "graph",
          "datasource": "${DS_GRAPHITE}"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

These inputs and their usage in data source properties are automatically added during export in Grafana 3.1. If you run an older version of Grafana and want to share a dashboard on Grafana.com you need to manually add the inputs and templatize the data source properties like above.

If you want to import a dashboard from Grafana.com into an older version of Grafana then you can either import it as usual and then update the data source option in the metrics tab so that the panel is using the correct data source. Another alternative is to open the json file in a text editor and update the data source properties to value that matches a name of your data source.

Note

In Grafana v5.3.4+ the export modal has new checkbox for sharing for external use (other instances). If the checkbox is not checked then the __inputs section will not be included in the exported JSON file.

JSON model

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Dashboard JSON model

A dashboard in Grafana is represented by a JSON object, which stores metadata of its dashboard. Dashboard metadata includes dashboard properties, metadata from panels, template variables, panel queries, etc.

To view the JSON of a dashboard:

Navigate to a dashboard.
In the top navigation menu, click the Dashboard settings (gear) icon.
Click JSON Model.

JSON fields

When a user creates a new dashboard, a new dashboard JSON object is initialized with the following fields:

Note: In the following JSON, id is shown as null which is the default value assigned to it until a dashboard is saved. Once a dashboard is saved, an integer value is assigned to the id field.

{
  "id": null,
  "uid": "cLV5GDCkz",
  "title": "New dashboard",
  "tags": [],
  "style": "dark",
  "timezone": "browser",
  "editable": true,
  "hideControls": false,
  "graphTooltip": 1,
  "panels": [],
  "time": {
    "from": "now-6h",
    "to": "now"
  },
  "timepicker": {
    "time_options": [],
    "refresh_intervals": []
  },
  "templating": {
    "list": []
  },
  "annotations": {
    "list": []
  },
  "refresh": "5s",
  "schemaVersion": 17,
  "version": 0,
  "links": []
}

Each field in the dashboard JSON is explained below with its usage:

Name	Usage
id	unique numeric identifier for the dashboard. (generated by the db)
uid	unique dashboard identifier that can be generated by anyone. string (8-40)
title	current title of dashboard
tags	tags associated with dashboard, an array of strings
style	theme of dashboard, i.e. `dark` or `light`
timezone	timezone of dashboard, i.e. `utc` or `browser`
editable	whether a dashboard is editable or not
graphTooltip	0 for no shared crosshair or tooltip (default), 1 for shared crosshair, 2 for shared crosshair AND shared tooltip
time	time range for dashboard, i.e. last 6 hours, last 7 days, etc
timepicker	timepicker metadata, see timepicker section for details
templating	templating metadata, see templating section for details
annotations	annotations metadata, see annotations section for details
refresh	auto-refresh interval
schemaVersion	version of the JSON schema (integer), incremented each time a Grafana update brings changes to said schema
version	version of the dashboard (integer), incremented each time the dashboard is updated
panels	panels array, see below for detail.

Panels

Panels are the building blocks of a dashboard. It consists of data source queries, type of graphs, aliases, etc. Panel JSON consists of an array of JSON objects, each representing a different panel. Most of the fields are common for all panels but some fields depend on the panel type. Following is an example of panel JSON of a text panel.

"panels": [
  {
    "type": "text",
    "title": "Panel Title",
    "gridPos": {
      "x": 0,
      "y": 0,
      "w": 12,
      "h": 9
    },
    "id": 4,
    "mode": "markdown",
    "content": "# title"
  }

Panel size and position

The gridPos property describes the panel size and position in grid coordinates.

w 1-24 (the width of the dashboard is divided into 24 columns)
h In grid height units, each represents 30 pixels.
x The x position, in same unit as w.
y The y position, in same unit as h.

The grid has a negative gravity that moves panels up if there is empty space above a panel.

timepicker

"timepicker": {
    "collapse": false,
    "enable": true,
    "notice": false,
    "now": true,
    "refresh_intervals": [
      "5s",
      "10s",
      "30s",
      "1m",
      "5m",
      "15m",
      "30m",
      "1h",
      "2h",
      "1d"
    ],
    "status": "Stable",
    "type": "timepicker"
  }

Usage of the fields is explained below:

Name	Usage
collapse	whether timepicker is collapsed or not
enable	whether timepicker is enabled or not
notice	TODO
now	TODO
refresh_intervals	TODO
status	TODO
type	TODO

templating

The templating field contains an array of template variables with their saved values along with some other metadata, for example:

 "templating": {
    "enable": true,
    "list": [
      {
        "allFormat": "wildcard",
        "current": {
          "tags": [],
          "text": "prod",
          "value": "prod"
        },
        "datasource": null,
        "includeAll": true,
        "name": "env",
        "options": [
          {
            "selected": false,
            "text": "All",
            "value": "*"
          },
          {
            "selected": false,
            "text": "stage",
            "value": "stage"
          },
          {
            "selected": false,
            "text": "test",
            "value": "test"
          }
        ],
        "query": "tag_values(cpu.utilization.average,env)",
        "refresh": false,
        "type": "query"
      },
      {
        "allFormat": "wildcard",
        "current": {
          "text": "apache",
          "value": "apache"
        },
        "datasource": null,
        "includeAll": false,
        "multi": false,
        "multiFormat": "glob",
        "name": "app",
        "options": [
          {
            "selected": true,
            "text": "tomcat",
            "value": "tomcat"
          },
          {
            "selected": false,
            "text": "cassandra",
            "value": "cassandra"
          }
        ],
        "query": "tag_values(cpu.utilization.average,app)",
        "refresh": false,
        "regex": "",
        "type": "query"
      }
    ]
  }

Usage of the above mentioned fields in the templating section is explained below:

Name	Usage
enable	whether templating is enabled or not
list	an array of objects each representing one template variable
allFormat	format to use while fetching all values from data source, eg: `wildcard`, `glob`, `regex`, `pipe`, etc.
current	shows current selected variable text/value on the dashboard
data source	shows data source for the variables
includeAll	whether all value option is available or not
multi	whether multiple values can be selected or not from variable value list
multiFormat	format to use while fetching timeseries from data source
name	name of variable
options	array of variable text/value pairs available for selection on dashboard
query	data source query used to fetch values for a variable
refresh	TODO
regex	TODO
type	type of variable, i.e. `custom`, `query` or `interval`

Scripted dashboards

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:26:57 +0000

Scripted dashboards

Warning: This feature is deprecated and will be removed in a future release.

If you have lots of metric names that change (new servers etc) in a defined pattern it is irritating to constantly have to create new dashboards.

With scripted dashboards you can dynamically create your dashboards using javascript. In the Grafana install folder under public/dashboards/ there is a file named scripted.js. This file contains an example of a scripted dashboard. You can access it by using the URL: http://grafana_url/dashboard/script/scripted.js?rows=3&name=myName

If you open scripted.js you can see how it reads URL parameters from ARGS variable and then adds rows and panels.

Example

var seriesName = 'argName';

if (!_.isUndefined(ARGS.name)) {
  seriesName = ARGS.name;
}

dashboard.panels.push({
  title: 'Events',
  type: 'graph',
  fill: 1,
  linewidth: 2,
  gridPos: {
    h: 10,
    w: 24,
    x: 0,
    y: 10,
  },
  targets: [
    {
      target: "randomWalk('" + seriesName + "')",
    },
    {
      target: "randomWalk('random walk2')",
    },
  ],
});

return dashboard;

More examples

You can find more examples in public/dashboards/ directory of your Grafana installation.

Dashboards on Grafana Labs

Dashboard UI

Working with Grafana dashboard UI

Dashboard Folders

Dashboard Folders

How To Create A Folder

Manage Dashboards

Dashboard Folder Page

Permissions

Create dashboards

Create dashboard

Manage dashboards

Manage dashboards

Annotations

Annotations

Native annotations

Adding annotations

Adding regions events

Built-in query

Query by tag

Querying other data sources

Annotation query details

Playlist

Playlist

Access, share, and control a playlist

Access playlist

Start a playlist

Control a playlist

Create a playlist

Edit or delete a playlist

Edit a playlist

Delete a playlist

Share a playlist in a view mode

Search

Dashboard Search

Find by dashboard name

Filter by Tag(s)

Keyboard shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts

Reporting

Reporting

Time range controls

Time range controls

Time units and relative ranges

Note about Grafana alerting

Common time range controls

Current time range

Relative time range

Absolute time range

Zoom out (Cmd+Z or Ctrl+Z)

Zoom in (only applicable to graph visualizations)

Refresh dashboard

Dashboard time settings

Panel time overrides and timeshift

Control the time range using a URL

Dashboard version history

Dashboard version history

Comparing two dashboard versions

Restoring to a previously saved dashboard version

Export and import

Export and import

Exporting a dashboard

Making a dashboard portable

Import dashboard

Discover dashboards on Grafana.com

Import and sharing with Grafana 2.x or 3.0

Note

JSON model

Dashboard JSON model

JSON fields

Panels

Panel size and position

timepicker

templating

Scripted dashboards

Scripted dashboards

Example

More examples