# Grafana vs Paessler PRTG: which do AI models recommend for infra monitoring, October 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, October 2026 Edition, Infrastructure monitoring. One of fourteen models named Grafana first on the direct prompt; one named Paessler PRTG. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/operations/infrastructure-monitoring/grafana-vs-paessler-prtg/

| | First-choice share | Rank | Negative rate | Labels | Models naming it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grafana | 4% | #6 of 13 | 6% | 33 | 12 of 14 |
| Paessler PRTG | 4% | #7 of 13 | 13% | 23 | 10 of 14 |

## The direct prompt, model by model

- GLM 4.7 FlashX: grafana first (first choices: Datadog, Grafana) (alternatives: Dynatrace, ManageEngine OpManager, New Relic)
- Perplexity Sonar: paessler prtg first (first choices: Paessler PRTG) (alternatives: Datadog, ManageEngine OpManager, New Relic, Site24x7, Zabbix)
- GPT-5.4 mini: neither first, one named (first choices: Datadog) (alternatives: Dynatrace, Grafana, New Relic)
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: neither first, one named (first choices: New Relic) (alternatives: Better Stack, Grafana, LogicMonitor, Site24x7)
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: neither first, one named (first choices: Datadog) (alternatives: Grafana, Middleware.io, Paessler PRTG, Prometheus + Grafana, Zabbix)
- Kimi K2: neither first, one named (first choices: LogicMonitor) (alternatives: Better Stack, New Relic, Paessler PRTG, Site24x7)
- GPT-6 Luna: neither first, one named (first choices: Datadog) (alternatives: Grafana, New Relic)
- Muse Glimmer 30B: neither first, one named (first choices: Datadog) (alternatives: LogicMonitor, ManageEngine OpManager, Paessler PRTG, Prometheus + Grafana, Site24x7, Zabbix)
- Claude Haiku 4.5: neither named
- Grok 4.1 Fast: neither named (first choices: New Relic) (alternatives: Datadog, ManageEngine OpManager, Site24x7)
- Mistral Small: neither named (first choices: ManageEngine OpManager, Site24x7) (alternatives: Netdata)
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: neither named (first choices: Site24x7) (alternatives: Grafana Stack, ManageEngine OpManager, New Relic)
- Llama 4 Maverick: neither named
- MiniMax M2.5: neither named (first choices: Datadog) (alternatives: ManageEngine OpManager, Prometheus + Grafana, Sematext)

## What the models said about Grafana

- "The Open-Standard / Developer-Preferred (Highly Recommend for 2026) * Grafana Cloud: Excellent for engineering-driven cultures." (Gemini 3.5 Flash, scale prompt, first choice)

## What the models said about Paessler PRTG

- "Paessler PRTG is not well-suited for cloud-native or container-heavy environments." (Claude Haiku 4.5, negative prompt, hard negative)
- "Limited to 100 sensors in the free tier ... paid tier can get expensive ... the UI feels dated" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt, soft negative)
- "user-friendly but limits scale without buying (~$1,750 for 500 sensors)" (Grok 4.1 Fast, budget prompt, soft negative)
- "PRTG - If you want a more established tool with a free version and willing to scale up later" (MiniMax M2.5, budget prompt, first choice)
- "the best *default* choice is usually PRTG Network Monitor" (Perplexity Sonar, direct prompt, first choice)
- "Paessler PRTG is a strong alternative because it offers a free tier up to 100 sensors" (Perplexity Sonar, budget prompt, alternative)

Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts over all fourteen models, for a mid-market B2B company; rank is within the category. Comparisons are drawn for the top eight products in each category. Published under CC BY 4.0; the output is the models' output, and nothing here is a recommendation by the index.