grafana-mcp-adapter

Read-only MCP server that exposes Grafana dashboards, datasources and metric/logqueries as tools, for use by skills in the TICKETS workspace.

This is a private, standalone adapter: its own git repo, its own .env. It isnot part of ia-tooling and does not depend on its stack — it only makes HTTPScalls out to the Grafana HTTP API (${GRAFANA_BASE_URL}/api). It was scaffolded bycloning the structure of fathom-mcp-adapter.

Architecture

The adapter is the MCP server. Internally it calls the Grafana HTTP APIdirectly (just as the Fathom adapter calls Fathom's REST API). MCP servers arenot chained to one another.

Auth: a Grafana service account token sent as a Bearer token in theAuthorization header. Scope it to a read-only role (Viewer). Create theservice account + token in Grafana → Administration → Service accounts.
Most tools return raw payloads (dashboard JSON, datasource lists). Theexceptions are the high-volume ones: grafana_query returns a compactper-series digest by default (a full up query is ~8 MB of frames, far pastwhat an MCP context wants), and grafana_logs_link returns a capped preview.Both can be pushed back toward raw (raw=true / a higher limit).
Read-only by design. Note that grafana_query is a POST (Grafana's/api/ds/query is POST-shaped) but only reads metrics/logs.

Tools

Tool	Purpose
`grafana_health`	Config/connectivity check (makes one authenticated call).
`grafana_search_dashboards`	Search dashboards by title substring and/or tags.
`grafana_get_dashboard`	Full dashboard JSON by `uid`.
`grafana_list_datasources`	List configured datasources (uid, name, type).
`grafana_query`	Run a PromQL/LogQL/etc. query against a datasource uid over a time range. Returns a per-series digest by default.
`grafana_logs_link`	Build a permanent Grafana Explore (Loki) deep link for a customer's logs and return a preview of recent lines.

`grafana_query` response shape

The raw /api/ds/query response carries a full timestamp+value array per series,and a query like up can return thousands of series (~8 MB). By default the toolcollapses each series to its labels + a numeric digest and caps the list:

{
  "results": {
    "A": {
      "status": 200,
      "series_count": 3085,        // total series before capping
      "series": [                  // capped to maxSeries (50)
        { "labels": { "job": "..." }, "count": 60, "first": 1, "last": 1, "min": 0, "max": 1, "avg": 0.98 }
      ],
      "truncated": 3035            // how many series were dropped from `series`
    }
  }
}

Pass raw=true to get the full (potentially very large) frames instead.

`grafana_logs_link`

Identify a customer/component with free text (client='april',component='gateway'); it matches case-insensitively against the service_namelabel, which on this instance encodes both (e.g.graviteeio-ae-april-rec-engine). Returns { query, explore_url, range, preview_count, preview } — paste explore_url (a permanent Grafana 11+ Explorelink) into the ticket. The default range is the last hour; widen withfrom/to. When nothing matches, it returns close service_name values assuggestions so typos like aprl → april surface.

Examples (how a user asks for it)

Just ask in plain language — the agent maps it to the client / component /from / to / line_filter arguments for you.

"Give me the last hour of API gateway logs for Northwind."→ { "client": "northwind", "component": "gateway" }

"Show me the engine logs for Contoso over the last 6 hours."→ { "client": "contoso", "component": "engine", "from": "now-6h" }

"Find the gateway errors for Globex in the last 3 hours, give me up to 200 lines."→ { "client": "globex", "component": "gateway", "line_filter": "error", "from": "now-3h", "limit": 200 }

"I need the UI logs for Initech during yesterday's incident between 10:00 and 11:00."→ { "client": "initech", "component": "ui", "from": "<epoch ms 10:00>", "to": "<epoch ms 11:00>" }

"Give me the production gateway logs for Northwind."→ { "client": "northwind prod", "component": "gateway" }

(The environment — prod, rec, dev — isn't a separate argument: it livesinside service_name, so just fold it into client as another word. Bothclient and component are matched as case-insensitive substrings with .*between them, so northwind prod matches …-northwind-prod-….)

Each call returns explore_url — paste it into the ticket as a permanent link —plus a capped preview of the newest matching lines.

Setup

npm install
cp .env.example .env   # then fill in GRAFANA_BASE_URL and GRAFANA_TOKEN
npm test
npm start              # speaks MCP over stdio

GRAFANA_TOKEN must come from .env (which is git-ignored) — never hardcode it.

Wiring into the TICKETS MCP session

Build the image and add a grafana entry to the TICKETS .mcp.json, alongsidefathom / zendesk / vectordb / github. It only needs HTTPS egress.

docker build -t grafana-mcp-adapter .

// .mcp.json (TICKETS)
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "grafana": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": ["run", "--rm", "-i", "--env-file", "/ABSOLUTE/PATH/TO/.env", "grafana-mcp-adapter"]
    }
  }
}

grafana-mcp-adapter