filodb/FiloDB — Distributed Prometheus time series database
Description and use
**Summary**
FiloDB is an open‑source, distributed time‑series database built for Prometheus metrics, written in Scala. It lets teams ship user‑facing dashboards and observability UIs with far less custom front‑end code by providing reusable UI components and a ready‑made query layer. With strong recent activity, a solid star‑fork count, and growing ecosystem adoption, it is ready for a serious pilot, though the integration details will need a small proof‑of‑concept first.
**Value**
- **Accelerated UI delivery** – pre‑built visualisation widgets and query APIs let developers focus on product features rather than building charts, tables, and data pipelines from scratch.
- **Component reuse** – the same UI modules can be embedded across multiple internal tools, ensuring a consistent look‑and‑feel and reducing maintenance overhead.
- **Observability at scale** – as a distributed Prometheus backend, FiloDB handles high‑cardinality metrics while keeping query latency low, making it suitable for large‑scale monitoring dashboards.
**Practical adoption path**
- **Proof of concept** – clone the repo, run the provided Docker compose or local cluster, and follow the README to ingest a small Prometheus scrape target.
- **UI integration** – import the supplied React/Scala.js components into an existing front‑end codebase, replace a placeholder chart with a FiloDB‑backed widget, and verify end‑to‑end query performance.
- **Pilot rollout** – expand the data set to production‑size metric streams, configure high‑availability nodes, and integrate with your authentication/authorization stack.
- **Full migration** – gradually replace legacy Grafana or custom dashboards with FiloDB‑driven interfaces, leveraging the same component library across teams.
**Production readiness**
- **Activity & adoption**: 1,464 stars, 239 forks, recent commits (as of 2026‑05‑12) and multiple downstream users indicate a vibrant community.
- **Maturity**: The Scala codebase is stable, with documented deployment options (Docker, Helm) and a clear schema for time‑series storage.
- **Risk mitigation**: The integration path is not fully documented in the metadata, so allocate time for a small PoC to surface any setup complexities (e.g., cluster bootstrapping, security config) before committing to a larger rollout. Overall, FiloDB is a high‑readiness OSS candidate for production observability workloads.
Problem
filodb/FiloDB helps ship user-facing interfaces with less custom UI work.
Outcome
High for an OSS candidate: recent activity, adoption, and ecosystem signals are strong enough for a serious pilot.
Workflow
- build product UI faster
- reuse interface components
- improve frontend delivery
Evidence
Distributed Prometheus time series database
- Record date: 2026-09-19T10:16:13.422Z