Open Source vs SaaS

HolmesGPT (Open Source)

At the core of Robusta is HolmesGPT — an open source, AI-powered agent that automatically investigates Kubernetes alerts and identifies root causes.

HolmesGPT pulls data from your cluster logs, events, metrics, and external data sources like Prometheus, Grafana, New Relic, and more. It uses LLMs to correlate evidence across sources and produce actionable root cause analysis — turning noisy alerts into clear answers.

HolmesGPT is MIT-licensed and can be used standalone or as part of the Robusta platform.

Deployment Options

  • Open Source Only: Run HolmesGPT on its own. No web UI. CLI interface and HTTP API on OSS.

  • SaaS: HolmesGPT + Robusta's hosted web UI with additional features including centralized alert management, multi-cluster visibility, and historical timelines.

  • Self-Hosted: HolmesGPT + on-premise web UI for organizations that require dedicated infrastructure (enterprise plans).

Which should I choose?

Most teams use the SaaS option for the complete feature set without infrastructure overhead.

Pricing

HolmesGPT is and always will be free. It is a CNCF sandbox project.

The Robusta Platform UI is free to get started on our SaaS. If you want to self-host the UI, you'll need an enterprise plan.

Contact support@robusta.dev for questions.

Robusta Classic

Before HolmesGPT, Robusta's open source engine focused on rule-based automation — enriching alerts with extra context (logs, pod status, resource graphs) and routing them to Slack, Teams, and other sinks using configurable playbooks. This is sometimes referred to as Robusta Classic.

If you are running Robusta Classic, upgrading to HolmesGPT is a configuration change — no migration required.

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