Understanding Prometheus Metric Types | Meaning and Usage (Gauge, Counter, Summary, Histogram)

This video explains the four different metric types in Prometheus: Gauges, Counters, Summaries, and Histograms. It goes into the meaning of each type, explains how to use each type in instrumentation, and how they show up in the exposition format. It also touches on what you have to watch out for when querying each metric type with PromQL. 00:00 Introduction 00:25 Gauges 01:00 Gauge Instrumentation Methods 01:40 Gauges in the Exposition Format 01:50 Querying Gauges 02:05 Gauges Containing Timestamps 02:18 Counters 02:44 Counter Resets 02:56 Counter Instrumentation Methods 03:48 Counters in the Exposition Format 03:58 Querying Counters (absolute values vs. rates) 04:53 Summaries 05:05 Constructing Summaries 05:15 Summary Instrumentation Methods 05:37 Summaries in the Exposition Format 06:01 Querying Summaries 06:45 Histograms 07:10 Cumulative Histograms 07:48 Constructing Histograms 07:58 Histogram Instrumentation Methods 08:08 Histograms in the Exposition Format 09:05 Querying Histograms (percentile calculation using histogram_quantile() ) 10:10 Average Request Latencies 10:29 Native Histograms 11:04 Outro & PromLabs Prometheus Trainings