Unlock Database Monitoring with Splunk Observability Cloud

[DayaSCanales]

In today’s fast-paced digital landscape, even minor database slowdowns can disrupt user experiences and stall productivity. As applications become more complex and databases are spread across microservices, traditional monitoring tools often fall short—making it tough for SRE, engineering, and database teams to collaborate effectively.

See how real-time insights and AI-powered recommendations can help you quickly pinpoint and resolve slow queries, correlate application issues, and save valuable developer time.

Don’t miss your chance to elevate your database performance—reply the event here!

[DayaSCanales]

What's next?

Here are a few more resources you might find helpful:

• Launch Blog: ​
  Resolve Database Performance Issues Faster With Splunk Database Monitoring
  
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• Documentation: ​
  Introduction to Splunk Database Monitoring
  
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• Video:
  Use Database Monitoring in Splunk Observability Cloud to Identify and Resolve Slow Queries

[DayaSCanales]

Here are a few top of mind questions from the live Tech Talk

Q. What features or abilities of Splunk are native to O11y versus what is gained by the additional purchase cost - can you separate those lines for us?

A. Splunk Database Monitoring provides visibility into slow and resource intensive queries running on the database and allow the user to troubleshoot the same using query performance metrics and most importantly explain plans.

Splunk Database Monitoring is another product along with APM, IM, RUM, in the overall Splunk Observability cloud offering.

Q. Great session! Is the AI recommendation feature available today, or is it planned for a future release?

A. Thank you, this is available right now.

Q. How this work with APM? Does it require any code changes?

A. To correlate database monitoring with APM. It require propagating trace context from application to DB and to that user just needs to enable a config flag in the APM agent.

Q. How is this licensed?

A. The licensing is based on number of databases instances irrespective of the database type supported. e.g. if you are running 20 PostgreSQL instances you just need 20 units.

Q. Also, can you share how licensing will be calculated on db specifically Postgres and mssql?

A. The The licensing is based on number of databases instances irrespective of the database type supported. e.g. if you are running 20 PostgreSQL instances you just need 20 units.

Q. Can you let us know how long is data retained?

A. Query performance and explain plan data is retained for 15 days. Metric data is retained as per usual Splunk Observability Cloud offering as documented here: Resolution and data retention.

Q. Can this be used standalone or does this require APM?

A. Splunk Database Monitoring can be used standalone and does not require APM or IM.

Q. For those of us who already have the full stack of Splunk Observability. Is there an extra license cost for this new feature?

A. Yes, database monitoring requires a separate license based on number of database instances one needs to monitor.

Q. Also, can you let us know what is gained that O11y can't do that this added license would provide?

A. Splunk Database Monitoring provides visibility into slow and resource intensive queries running on the database and allow the user to troubleshoot the same using query performance metrics and most importantly explain plans.

Q. It appears at this point, only Microsoft SQL Server or Oracle Database are supported. What are the other databases that you are planning to support in the future? Can you share the timeline/roadmap ?

A. As of March 2026, we support SQL Server, Oracle, PostgreSQL. We have plans to support MySQL, MongoDB, and DB2 in next 6 months time frame, please stay tune for future updates.

Q. Does this work across hybrid or multi-cloud database environments?

A. Splunk Database Monitoring works across private, public, or hybrid cloud setups.

Q. We didn't see how the tool sent alerts, can you please explain how the alert system works?

A. Alerting is similar to how it works for other products in Splunk O11y Cloud.

Q. Do we need to deploy agent on the database servers?

A. No, the database receivers in the OTel collector can be deployed on a separate host as long as there is connectivity between that host and the database server.

Q. Can the AI recommendations be used as a payload to the incident tickets?

A. AI recommendations are generated on-demand and are not part of the alert payload.

Q. Do you need a separate license for each tool in SQL Server? SSIS, RS, or does one license cover every tool used by one Instance of SLQ Server?

A. As of today it does not support SSIS, RS, etc. The support for these might be planned in future releases and that might come at additional cost, possibly.