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dashboard publish

What this page covers

Publish one local dashboard JSON file through the existing dashboard import pipeline.

When to open this page

  • Use this when a local draft is ready to go live and you want the command to stage or push it through the same import path used by the CLI.

Who this page is for

Best for SREs, Grafana operators, and responders working with dashboard inventory, migration, inspection, or screenshots.

Purpose

Publish one local dashboard JSON file through the existing dashboard import pipeline.

When to use

Use this when a local draft is ready to go live and you want the command to stage or push it through the same import path used by the CLI.

Key flags

  • --input: dashboard JSON file to publish. Use - to read one wrapped or bare dashboard JSON document from standard input.
  • --replace-existing: update an existing dashboard when the UID already exists.
  • --folder-uid: override the destination folder UID. The built-in General folder is normalized back to the default root publish path instead of sending a literal general folder UID.
  • --message: revision message stored in Grafana.
  • --dry-run: preview the publish without changing Grafana.
  • --watch: rerun publish or dry-run whenever the local input file changes. Use this with a local file path, not --input -. The watcher reports change detection, transient failures, and reruns, and keeps watching until you stop it.
  • --table, --json: dry-run output modes.

Examples

# Purpose: Publish one local dashboard JSON file through the existing dashboard import pipeline.
grafana-util dashboard publish --url http://localhost:3000 --basic-user admin --basic-password admin --input ./drafts/cpu-main.json --folder-uid infra --message 'Promote CPU dashboard'
# Purpose: Publish one local dashboard JSON file through the existing dashboard import pipeline.
grafana-util dashboard publish --url http://localhost:3000 --basic-user admin --basic-password admin --input ./drafts/cpu-main.json --dry-run --table
# Purpose: Publish one generated dashboard from standard input.
jsonnet dashboards/cpu.jsonnet | grafana-util dashboard publish --url http://localhost:3000 --token "$GRAFANA_API_TOKEN" --input - --replace-existing
# Purpose: Watch one local draft file and rerun dry-run after each save.
grafana-util dashboard publish --url http://localhost:3000 --basic-user admin --basic-password admin --input ./drafts/cpu-main.json --dry-run --watch