Grafana Assistant everywhere: Customize and connect to the AI agent to fit your specific needs

Grafana is evolving its Assistant, a purpose-built LLM agent, to be more accessible and customizable for diverse environments, as announced during GrafanaCON 2026. Previously available only in Grafana Cloud, Assistant is now extended to Grafana Enterprise and Grafana OSS users, allowing them to connect from self-managed environments and use it for real-time data analysis, dashboard building, and incident resolution. This expansion aims to incorporate AI into software development workflows by minimizing context switching and offering new integrations with tools like Slack, Microsoft Teams, and APIs, thereby enhancing observability practices. Users can customize Assistant through "skills," which guide agents with specialized knowledge and automate tasks, while new features like Assistant automations and a remote hosted MCP server broaden its functional scope. The initiative underscores Grafana's commitment to providing flexible AI-driven solutions that cater to varying organizational needs and promote efficient software development cycles.