PMM installation overview

Installing Percona Monitoring and Management (PMM) involves setting up a central PMM Server and distributed PMM Clients that work together to monitor your database environment.

PMM Server provides the web interface with dashboards and analytics, while PMM Clients collect data from your databases with minimal performance impact and send it back to PMM Server for analysis and visualization.

What the installation involves

The PMM installation consists of three main steps that need to be completed in sequence:

1. Install PMM Server: centralized platform that collects, analyzes, and visualizes your monitoring data
2. Install PMM Clients: lightweight agents on each database host that collect metrics without impacting performance
3. Configure monitoring services: connect PMM to your database instances, select which metrics to collect, and customize monitoring parameters

Planning the installation

Before installing PMM, make sure to first:

• Choose a deployment strategy based on your environment needs.
• Verify hardware requirements to ensure your system meets the necessary specifications.
• Configure your network for the required connections.

Installation steps

1. Install PMM Server

Install and run at least one PMM Server using one of the following deployment methods. If you’re sure which deployment method is best for your environment, check out this Choose a PMM deployment strategy topic for a comparison of your options:

Docker Podman Helm Virtual Appliance AWS Marketplace

Run PMM Server as a Docker container

Get started with Docker deployment

Run PMM Server as a rootless Podman container

Get started with Podman deployment

Deploy PMM Server on a Kubernetes cluster

Get started with Kubernetes deployment

Run PMM Server as a pre-configured virtual machine

Get started with Virtual Appliance

Deploy PMM Server from AWS Marketplace

Get started with AWS deployment

2. Install PMM Client

Install and run PMM Client on every node where there is a service you want to monitor. Choose the installation method that best fits your environment:

Client installation options

With package manager With binary package With Docker

Linux package: Use apt, apt-get, dnf, yum. |The package manager automatically selects the correct version for your architecture.

Binary package: Download the appropriate .tar.gz file for your architecture (x86_64 or ARM64).

Running PMM Client as a Docker container simplifies deployment across different architectures and automatically selects the appropriate image for your architecture (x86_64 or ARM64).

3. Add services for monitoring

After installing PMM Client, configure the nodes and services you want to monitor.

PMM supports monitoring across the following database technologies, cloud services, proxy services, and system metrics:

Databases Cloud services System monitoring Proxy services External services

Choose the database technology you want to monitor:

Database	Description	Setup guide
MySQL	MySQL, Percona Server for MySQL, MariaDB	Connect to MySQL
PostgreSQL	PostgreSQL database servers	Connect to PostgreSQL
MongoDB	MongoDB, Percona Server for MongoDB	Connect to MongoDB

Configure monitoring for cloud-hosted database services:

Cloud provider	Supported services	Setup guide
Amazon Web Services	Amazon RDS for MySQL/PostgreSQL, Aurora	Configure AWS monitoring
Microsoft Azure	Azure Database for MySQL/PostgreSQL, Cosmos DB	Configure Azure monitoring
Google Cloud	Cloud SQL for MySQL/PostgreSQL	Configure Google Cloud monitoring

Monitor operating system and remote services:

Monitoring type	Description	Setup guide
Linux systems	CPU, memory, disk, network metrics	Configure Linux monitoring
Remote MySQL	Monitor MySQL across network segments	Configure remote MySQL
Remote PostgreSQL	Monitor PostgreSQL across network segments	Configure remote PostgreSQL
Remote MongoDB	Monitor MongoDB across network segments	Configure remote MongoDB

Monitor database proxy and load balancing solutions:

Proxy service	Description	Setup guide
ProxySQL	MySQL database proxy	Configure ProxySQL monitoring
HAProxy	High-availability load balancer	Configure HAProxy monitoring

Extend PMM with external exporters and third-party metrics:

Service type	Description	Setup guide
Custom exporters	Add custom Prometheus exporters	Configure external exporters
Third-party sources	Connect external metrics sources	Extend monitoring capabilities
General external services	Generic external service monitoring	Configure external services

What’s next

After completing the installation, you can:

• Configure alerts to notify you of critical events
• Set up backup management to protect your data
• Explore dashboards to monitor your database performance
• Analyze query performance to identify and optimize slow queries