Graylog is a log-management stack: stand up MongoDB and OpenSearch, ship syslog, and search what you kept. That is not a mechanic. Tink installs in one command, watches the Linux server, explains what is wrong, and helps you fix it.
Accidental sysadmins land on Graylog because “open-source log management” sounds like monitoring. Then the work is Java heap, OpenSearch RAM, extractors, and a full disk that still means you SSH in.
Tink is the other job: detect the issue on the machine, say why it happened in plain English, propose the command, and run it only after you approve. Keep Graylog if you already search security and application logs at volume. Use Tink if you run Linux servers and want a mechanic.
| Feature | Tink | Graylog |
|---|---|---|
| Setup time | 30 seconds (one curl | sh command) | Hours to days — Graylog, MongoDB, OpenSearch, inputs, extractors, and heap |
| What you get | Working monitoring, diagnosis, and approved fixes | Log ingest, search, streams, dashboards, and alerts if you wire them |
| Pricing | Free (Scout) / $9 / $29 per machine per month | Open is free software; the cluster, RAM, and Enterprise/Cloud volume are not |
| Hidden costs | None — fully managed | OpenSearch disk, Java heap, extractor maintenance, and a person who lives in Graylog |
| Monitoring approach | Agent on the server — CPU, disk, services, logs, certs, ports | Ship syslog/GELF into Graylog, then query what you kept |
| Configuration | None after install — heuristics and AI | Inputs, extractors, pipelines, streams, index sets, and alert conditions |
| Plain-English diagnosis | Yes — AI explains root cause, impact, and fix | You search a stream, then SSH in to change the box |
| Fix execution | Proposes and executes approved commands with an audit trail | Log search only — Graylog cannot restart nginx or free disk |
| Alerting | Built-in across 8 channels | Alert conditions after you define streams, fields, and notification callbacks |
| Predictive alerts | Yes — disk fills in ~6 days, memory and CPU trends | Not a Graylog default — you write a pipeline or wait for a log threshold |
| SSH brute-force detection | Built-in — parses auth.log every scan | Possible if auth logs are ingested and someone wrote the stream |
| Machine offline detection | Agent presence monitoring with multi-channel alerts | Host missing if the shipper stops — if you built that alert |
| Public status page | Shareable URL with 90-day history | Internal dashboards — customer status is extra work |
| Weekly fleet digest | Automated Monday digest + daily brief when issues are open | Saved searches — not a plain-English fleet narrative |
| On-call tracking | Built-in /oncall command + incident acknowledgment | Route Graylog notifications to PagerDuty, Slack, or another incident tool |
| Conversation interface | Telegram, WhatsApp, web dashboard, CLI | Graylog web UI |
| Learning curve | None — works after install | Steep — OpenSearch ops, extractors, pipelines, and Graylog's own vocabulary |
| Best for | Freelancers, small teams, accidental sysadmins (1-50 Linux servers) | Security/log teams that already run OpenSearch and need SIEM-style search |
Keep Graylog when you already want that exact job:
The search UI is already in the browser. A working ops loop for five Linux boxes is not:
For a 5-server team, Tink Mechanic at $45/month is cheaper than hosting Graylog plus OpenSearch, and every scan includes a diagnosis a log search will not type.
No OpenSearch cluster. No extractor homework. No index retention. One command install.
Try Tink free — one command installAlso compare: Tink vs Elastic · Tink vs Splunk · Tink vs Sematext