How it works - Amazon GameLift Servers
Services or capabilities described in Amazon Web Services documentation might vary by Region. To see the differences applicable to the China Regions, see Getting Started with Amazon Web Services in China (PDF).

How it works

The telemetry metrics system follows a simple four-stage data flow from your game servers to visualization dashboards.

Collection: Your game server, integrated with the GameLift Server SDK or plugin, automatically emits metrics to a local telemetry collector running on the same instance. The SDK captures both automatic metrics (server lifecycle, resource usage) and custom metrics you define in your code.

Processing: The telemetry collector aggregates metrics from your game server and combines them with instance-level performance data (CPU, memory, network, disk usage). This provides a complete picture of both your game's performance and the underlying infrastructure.

Storage: Processed metrics are exported to your choice of metrics warehouse - Amazon Managed Service for Prometheus for high-performance time-series storage, Amazon CloudWatch for Amazon service integration, or both. All data transmission is authenticated and encrypted.

Visualization: Amazon Managed Grafana connects to your metrics warehouse to display pre-built GameLift dashboards. These dashboards provide fleet overviews, server performance details, and container monitoring views that help you monitor and troubleshoot your game hosting infrastructure.

Note

All metric transmission between your game server and the telemetry collector occurs locally on the instance for security. Only the collector communicates with Amazon services using proper authentication.