grafana-loki is a free and open-source horizontally-scalable log aggregation system. Developed by Grafana Labs, Loki provides efficient log aggregation inspired by Prometheus, serving as an alternative to Elasticsearch/ELK or Splunk

Hardware Requirements:

CPU: 2+ cores recommended

RAM: 1GB minimum (4GB+ recommended)

Storage: 10GB+ for logs

Network: HTTP/gRPC connectivity

Operating System:

Linux: Any modern distribution (RHEL, Debian, Ubuntu, CentOS, Fedora, Arch, Alpine, openSUSE)

macOS: 10.14+ (Mojave or newer)

Windows: Windows Server 2016+ or Windows 10

FreeBSD: 11.0+

Network Requirements:

Port 3100 (default grafana-loki port)

Port 9095 for gRPC

Dependencies:

See official documentation for specific requirements

System Access: root or sudo privileges required

This guide supports installation on:

RHEL 8/9 and derivatives (CentOS Stream, Rocky Linux, AlmaLinux)

Debian 11/12

Ubuntu 20.04/22.04/24.04 LTS

Arch Linux (rolling release)

Alpine Linux 3.18+

openSUSE Leap 15.5+ / Tumbleweed

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) 15+

macOS 12+ (Monterey and later)

FreeBSD 13+

Windows 10/11/Server 2019+ (where applicable)

bash

# Install EPEL repository if needed
sudo dnf install -y epel-release

# Install grafana-loki
sudo dnf install -y loki

# Enable and start service
sudo systemctl enable --now loki

# Configure firewall
sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-port=3100/tcp
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

# Verify installation
loki --version

bash

# Update package index
sudo apt update

# Install grafana-loki
sudo apt install -y loki

# Enable and start service
sudo systemctl enable --now loki

# Configure firewall
sudo ufw allow 3100

# Verify installation
loki --version

bash

# Install grafana-loki
sudo pacman -S loki

# Enable and start service
sudo systemctl enable --now loki

# Verify installation
loki --version

bash

# Install grafana-loki
apk add --no-cache loki

# Enable and start service
rc-update add loki default
rc-service loki start

# Verify installation
loki --version

bash

# Install grafana-loki
sudo zypper install -y loki

# Enable and start service
sudo systemctl enable --now loki

# Configure firewall
sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-port=3100/tcp
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

# Verify installation
loki --version

bash

# Using Homebrew
brew install loki

# Start service
brew services start loki

# Verify installation
loki --version

bash

# Using pkg
pkg install loki

# Enable in rc.conf
echo 'loki_enable="YES"' >> /etc/rc.conf

# Start service
service loki start

# Verify installation
loki --version

bash

# Using Chocolatey
choco install loki

# Or using Scoop
scoop install loki

# Verify installation
loki --version

bash

# Create configuration directory
sudo mkdir -p /etc/loki

# Set up basic configuration
# See official documentation for detailed configuration options

# Test configuration
loki --version

bash

# Enable service
sudo systemctl enable loki

# Start service
sudo systemctl start loki

# Stop service
sudo systemctl stop loki

# Restart service
sudo systemctl restart loki

# Check status
sudo systemctl status loki

# View logs
sudo journalctl -u loki -f

bash

# Enable service
rc-update add loki default

# Start service
rc-service loki start

# Stop service
rc-service loki stop

# Restart service
rc-service loki restart

# Check status
rc-service loki status

bash

# Enable in /etc/rc.conf
echo 'loki_enable="YES"' >> /etc/rc.conf

# Start service
service loki start

# Stop service
service loki stop

# Restart service
service loki restart

# Check status
service loki status

bash

# Using Homebrew services
brew services start loki
brew services stop loki
brew services restart loki

# Check status
brew services list | grep loki

powershell

# Start service
net start loki

# Stop service
net stop loki

# Using PowerShell
Start-Service loki
Stop-Service loki
Restart-Service loki

# Check status
Get-Service loki

See the official documentation for advanced configuration options.

nginx

upstream loki_backend {
    server 127.0.0.1:3100;
}

server {
    listen 80;
    server_name loki.example.com;
    return 301 https://$server_name$request_uri;
}

server {
    listen 443 ssl http2;
    server_name loki.example.com;

    ssl_certificate /etc/ssl/certs/loki.example.com.crt;
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/ssl/private/loki.example.com.key;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://loki_backend;
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
    }
}

apache

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerName loki.example.com
    Redirect permanent / https://loki.example.com/
</VirtualHost>

<VirtualHost *:443>
    ServerName loki.example.com
    
    SSLEngine on
    SSLCertificateFile /etc/ssl/certs/loki.example.com.crt
    SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/ssl/private/loki.example.com.key
    
    ProxyRequests Off
    ProxyPreserveHost On
    
    ProxyPass / http://127.0.0.1:3100/
    ProxyPassReverse / http://127.0.0.1:3100/
</VirtualHost>

haproxy

frontend loki_frontend
    bind *:80
    bind *:443 ssl crt /etc/ssl/certs/loki.pem
    redirect scheme https if !{ ssl_fc }
    default_backend loki_backend

backend loki_backend
    balance roundrobin
    server loki1 127.0.0.1:3100 check

bash

# Set appropriate permissions
sudo chown -R loki:loki /etc/loki
sudo chmod 750 /etc/loki

# Configure firewall
sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-port=3100/tcp
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

# Enable SELinux policies (if applicable)
sudo setsebool -P httpd_can_network_connect on

See official documentation for database configuration requirements.

bash

# Basic system tuning
echo 'net.core.somaxconn = 65535' | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf
echo 'net.ipv4.tcp_max_syn_backlog = 65535' | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf
sudo sysctl -p

bash

# Check service status
sudo systemctl status loki

# View logs
sudo journalctl -u loki -f

# Monitor resource usage
top -p $(pgrep loki)

bash

#!/bin/bash
# Basic backup script
BACKUP_DIR="/backup/loki"
DATE=$(date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S)

mkdir -p "$BACKUP_DIR"
tar -czf "$BACKUP_DIR/loki-backup-$DATE.tar.gz" /etc/loki /var/lib/loki

echo "Backup completed: $BACKUP_DIR/loki-backup-$DATE.tar.gz"

bash

# Stop service
sudo systemctl stop loki

# Restore from backup
tar -xzf /backup/loki/loki-backup-*.tar.gz -C /

# Start service
sudo systemctl start loki

1. Service won't start:

bash

# Check logs
sudo journalctl -u loki -n 100
sudo tail -f /var/log/loki/loki.log

# Check configuration
loki --version

# Check permissions
ls -la /etc/loki

2. Connection issues:

bash

# Check if service is listening
sudo ss -tlnp | grep 3100

# Test connectivity
telnet localhost 3100

# Check firewall
sudo firewall-cmd --list-all

3. Performance issues:

bash

# Check resource usage
top -p $(pgrep loki)

# Check disk I/O
iotop -p $(pgrep loki)

# Check connections
ss -an | grep 3100

yaml

version: '3.8'
services:
  loki:
    image: loki:latest
    ports:
      - "3100:3100"
    volumes:
      - ./config:/etc/loki
      - ./data:/var/lib/loki
    restart: unless-stopped

Maintenance

bash

# RHEL/CentOS/Rocky/AlmaLinux
sudo dnf update loki

# Debian/Ubuntu
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade loki

# Arch Linux
sudo pacman -Syu loki

# Alpine Linux
apk update && apk upgrade loki

# openSUSE
sudo zypper update loki

# FreeBSD
pkg update && pkg upgrade loki

# Always backup before updates
tar -czf /backup/loki-pre-update-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz /etc/loki

# Restart after updates
sudo systemctl restart loki

Regular Maintenance

bash

# Log rotation
sudo logrotate -f /etc/logrotate.d/loki

# Clean old logs
find /var/log/loki -name "*.log" -mtime +30 -delete

# Check disk usage
du -sh /var/lib/loki

Official Documentation: https://docs.loki.org/

GitHub Repository: https://github.com/loki/loki

Community Forum: https://forum.loki.org/

Best Practices Guide: https://docs.loki.org/best-practices

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Note: This guide is part of the HowToMgr collection. Always refer to official documentation for the most up-to-date information.

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grafana-loki Installation Guide