Grafana UI Overview

The Grafana interface is designed to be clean and fast. Once you understand the layout, you can find any feature in seconds. This topic maps every area of the screen so you feel at home from day one.

The Main Layout

When you log in, you land on the Grafana Home page. The screen divides into two main zones: the left sidebar for navigation and the main content area for dashboards and settings.

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  Top Bar: Search | New Dashboard | User Menu         │
├─────────┬────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│         │                                            │
│  Left   │         Main Content Area                  │
│ Sidebar │    (Dashboards, Panels, Settings)          │
│         │                                            │
│ [Home]  │                                            │
│ [Star]  │                                            │
│ [Dash]  │                                            │
│ [Alert] │                                            │
│ [Expl]  │                                            │
│ [Admin] │                                            │
└─────────┴────────────────────────────────────────────┘

The Left Sidebar

The sidebar is your navigation hub. Hover over each icon to see its label. The icons change slightly between Grafana versions, but the core sections remain the same.

Home

Clicking the Grafana logo or the house icon takes you back to the Home page. The Home page displays recently viewed dashboards and quick-start links.

Search (Magnifying Glass)

Click the search icon to find any dashboard by name. Type a keyword and results appear instantly. You can also filter by tag or folder.

Starred Dashboards

Mark any dashboard as a favourite by clicking the star icon on it. The Starred section shows all your favourited dashboards for fast access.

Dashboards

This section lists all dashboards organised into folders. You create, move, import, and delete dashboards from here.

Explore

Explore is a sandbox workspace. You write queries and see the raw results as charts or tables without building a full dashboard first. Think of it as a scratchpad for data investigation.

Alerting

All alert rules, contact points, and notification policies live here. You set up alerts in this section, covered in detail in later topics.

Connections (Data Sources)

This area manages all connections to external data systems. You add, edit, and test data sources here.

Administration

The admin section controls users, teams, organizations, plugins, and server-wide settings. Only admin-role users see the full Administration menu.

The Top Bar

The top bar sits above the main content area and contains three important elements.

Search Bar

The central search box lets you jump to any dashboard quickly without opening the sidebar search.

New Dashboard Button

A prominent "New" or "+" button lets you create a new dashboard or folder in one click.

User Menu (Top Right)

Click your profile picture or initials to open the user menu. From here you change your password, set preferences like light or dark theme, and sign out.

Dashboard View

When you open a dashboard, the toolbar at the top provides dashboard-specific controls.

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Dashboard Name  │ Time Range Picker │ Refresh │ Share │ Save │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                                                              │
│   ┌──────────┐  ┌──────────┐  ┌──────────┐                   │
│   │  Panel 1 │  │  Panel 2 │  │  Panel 3 │                   │
│   │  (Graph) │  │  (Stat)  │  │  (Table) │                   │
│   └──────────┘  └──────────┘  └──────────┘                   │
│                                                              │
│   ┌───────────────────────────────────────┐                  │
│   │           Panel 4 (Wide Graph)        │                  │
│   └───────────────────────────────────────┘                  │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Time Range Picker

The time range picker controls the data window shown in every panel. "Last 1 hour" shows one hour of data. "Last 7 days" shows a week. You can also type a custom range like "2024-01-01 to 2024-01-07". Every panel on the dashboard updates instantly when you change the time range.

Refresh Button and Auto-Refresh

Click the refresh icon to load the latest data immediately. Click the dropdown arrow next to it to set an auto-refresh interval — for example, every 10 seconds. This keeps dashboards live without manual refreshing.

Share Button

Generate a shareable link, export the dashboard as an image, or create a public snapshot from this button.

Save Button

Grafana does not auto-save dashboards. Click Save (or press Ctrl+S) after every change to preserve your work.

Panel Hover Menu

Hover over any panel and three dots appear in the top-right corner of the panel. Click them to open a menu with options to edit, duplicate, share, or remove that panel.

Dark and Light Themes

Grafana supports dark mode (default) and light mode. Go to your user menu → Preferences → UI Theme to switch. Dark mode reduces eye strain in low-light environments; light mode works better for printed screenshots.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Press the question mark key ? anywhere in Grafana to open the keyboard shortcuts panel. Useful shortcuts include:

• G + H – Go to Home
• G + D – Go to Dashboards
• G + E – Go to Explore
• D + S – Open dashboard settings
• Ctrl + S – Save the current dashboard
• Esc – Close the panel editor