Dashboard JSON model - Amazon Managed Grafana

Dashboard JSON model

This documentation topic is designed for Grafana workspaces that support Grafana version 9.x.

For Grafana workspaces that support Grafana version 10.x, see Working in Grafana version 10.

For Grafana workspaces that support Grafana version 8.x, see Working in Grafana version 8.

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, and panel queries.

To view the JSON of a dashboard.

  1. Navigate to a dashboard.

  2. In the top navigation menu, click the Dashboard settings (gear) icon.

  3. 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. After 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,
  "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": []
}

The following describes each field in the dashboard JSON.

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, such as dark or light

timezone

timezone of dashboard, such as utc or browser

editable

if 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, such as last 6 hours or last 7 days

timepicker

timepicker metadata, see timepicker section for details

templating

templating metadata, see templating section for details

annotations

annotations metadata, see annotations for how to add them

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, and more. 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. The 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 up panels 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"
  }

Templating

The templating field contains an array of template variables with their saved values along with some other metadata.

"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"
      }
    ]
  }