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Connect your New Relic account to enable CloudThinker agents to monitor application performance, inspect infrastructure, run NRQL queries, review alerts, and investigate incidents across your observability stack.

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Supported Regions

RegionMCP Endpoint
USmcp.newrelic.com
EUmcp.eu.newrelic.com
Select the region that matches your account. An EU account connected with the US region (or vice versa) will fail authentication or return empty results.

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Prerequisites

You need the New Relic AI MCP server enabled and a User API key (NRAK-…).

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Enable the New Relic AI MCP server

CloudThinker connects to New Relic through the New Relic AI MCP server, which is in public preview and must be turned on before connecting.
  1. In New Relic, click your username in the bottom-left corner
  2. Go to Administration → Previews & Trials
  3. Enable the New Relic AI MCP server preview toggle
The New Relic AI MCP server is a public preview feature. Per New Relic’s terms, use with accounts or data subject to FedRAMP or HIPAA compliance mandates is strictly prohibited.

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Create a User API key

  1. Open API keys (user menu → API keys, or go to one.newrelic.com/api-keys; EU: one.eu.newrelic.com/api-keys)
  2. Click Create a key and set Key type to User
  3. Name it (e.g., CloudThinker) and save
  4. Copy the key value — the full NRAK-… key is shown only once at creation
Use a User API key (NRAK-…). License, ingest, and query keys are for data ingestion and will not work for querying — this is the most common setup mistake.
Create the User API key under a dedicated read-only service user. The key inherits that user’s permissions, so a least-privilege user keeps the integration scoped to read access.

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Setup

1

Open CloudThinker

Navigate to Connections → New Relic in your CloudThinker workspace and click Connect New Relic.
2

Name the connection

Enter an Alias (a unique identifier for this instance, e.g. production) and a Description.
3

Enter NEWRELIC_API_KEY

Paste your New Relic User API key (NRAK-…).
4

Select NEWRELIC_REGION

Choose US (mcp.newrelic.com) or EU (mcp.eu.newrelic.com) to match your New Relic account.
5

Connect

Click Connect. CloudThinker will verify the credentials and show a Connected status.

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Connection Details

FieldDescriptionExample
NEWRELIC_API_KEYYour New Relic User API key (NRAK- prefix)NRAK-XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
NEWRELIC_REGIONThe region that matches your accountUS / EU
The NEWRELIC_API_KEY authenticates requests, and NEWRELIC_REGION selects the correct New Relic MCP endpoint — US (mcp.newrelic.com) or EU (mcp.eu.newrelic.com).

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Required Permissions

The User API key inherits the permissions of the user it belongs to. For least-privilege, scope that user to read-only access.
  • For MCP server access, the key’s user must be in a group assigned Organization Read Only, Organization Manager, or Organization Product Admin — or a custom organization-scoped role granting the MCP read permission. For least privilege, use Organization Read Only.
  • For NerdGraph / NRQL querying, a read-only role is sufficient.

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Agent Capabilities

Once connected, agents can query and investigate across your New Relic environment:
CategoryWhat the agent can do
APMInspect application performance — throughput, error rates, and transaction traces
InfrastructureList hosts and containers, review resource utilization
NRQLRun NRQL queries via NerdGraph against any telemetry
AlertsReview alert policies, conditions, and open violations
LogsSearch and analyze logs across services and environments
EntitiesDiscover and inspect monitored entities and services
IncidentsInvestigate open issues and retrieve full incident detail
DashboardsInspect dashboard configurations
Connection HealthValidate that the New Relic connection is working

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Example Prompts

@alex check error rates for the checkout service in New Relic over the last hour
@alex run an NRQL query for the slowest transactions in the production app
@alex list any open alert violations and investigate the root cause
@alex show host resource utilization and flag anything running hot
@alex investigate the most recent incident and summarize the impacted services

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Troubleshooting

  • Verify you are using a User API key (NRAK-…), not a license, ingest, or query key
  • Confirm the key was not deleted or rotated in New Relic
  • Ensure the key’s user still has access to the account
  • Check that the selected region matches your account (EU accounts must use EU)
  • An EU account on the US endpoint (or vice versa) returns no data
  • Disconnect and reconnect with the correct region
  • The key’s user may lack the MCP-server read role — assign a role such as Organization Read Only, Organization Manager, Organization Product Admin, or a custom organization-scoped role with MCP read permission
  • The User API key inherits its user’s account scope, so confirm that user has access to the account whose data you expect
  • Confirm the New Relic AI MCP server preview is enabled under Administration → Previews & Trials
  • The connection cannot function until the preview is turned on

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Security Best Practices

  • Use a dedicated read-only service user — create the User API key under it for least-privilege access
  • Scope the role — grant only MCP read / NerdGraph read access, nothing more
  • Rotate regularly — periodically rotate the User API key and update it in CloudThinker
  • Revoke when unused — delete the key in New Relic if you disconnect the integration
https://mintcdn.com/cloudthinker/aLd-ttc-SCW-aFky/images/icons/datadog.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=aLd-ttc-SCW-aFky&q=85&s=e8382167f2a1eb1e00971b5f4d703d48

Datadog Connection

Alternative APM and observability
https://mintcdn.com/cloudthinker/aLd-ttc-SCW-aFky/images/icons/grafana.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=aLd-ttc-SCW-aFky&q=85&s=c1329049025cd3c3a0909b400baef7be

Grafana Connection

Metrics and dashboards