EU Sovereignty Score
EU-hosted, non-EU parentTesting & QAHeadquarters: SE

k6 (Grafana Labs): sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

k6 is an open-source performance testing tool, described by Grafana as developer-friendly and extensible. Tests are written as scripts using a JavaScript API, while the tool itself is built with Go. It supports load, spike, stress and soak tests, browser performance testing, synthetic monitoring and CI/CD test automation. You run it with the k6 command-line tool on your own infrastructure, or use Grafana Cloud k6, a managed service built on k6 that stores results and offers dashboards and test runs from multiple locations.

k6 started at a Stockholm-based company and was acquired by Grafana Labs in 2021; Grafana Labs now creates and maintains it and describes itself as a fully remote company. The open-source tool is licensed under AGPL-3.0, so it can be run entirely on infrastructure you control. The documentation consulted does not state in which regions Grafana Cloud k6 stores data, so a European organisation using the managed service should confirm data location and the provider's jurisdiction, or run k6 itself.

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Sovereignty score
82 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign
  • Jurisdiction SOV-2100
    Headquartered in the EU: European law applies
  • Data residency SOV-350
    Hosting inside and outside Europe (EU, US)
  • Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-390
    Self-hostable: encryption keys under your own control
  • Freedom from lock-in SOV-680
    Open source: low switching costs
  • Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-690
    Source code auditable, forkable and self-hostable

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 9, 2026
HeadquartersSE (EU)Verified by hand
Ultimate parent companyUSVerified by hand
Sovereignty modelVendor-hosted (EU)Verified by hand
Data hostingEU, USVerified by hand
Open-sourceYesVerified by hand
GDPR-compliantYesVendor-stated
Hosting signalAMAZON-02 - Amazon.com, Inc., US (US)Technically measured
CategoryTesting & QA
TypeProduct
Websitek6.io ↗

The hosting signal shows the network that serves the vendor's website, often a CDN, and not necessarily where the service or your data is hosted. How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to k6 (Grafana Labs)

The European alternatives to k6 (Grafana Labs) come from our knowledge base of over 6,200 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

29 European Testing & QA vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with k6 (Grafana Labs)

k6 (Grafana Labs) is headquartered in SE and therefore falls under European law: the GDPR, NIS2 and the Data Act. No foreign legislation can compel access to your data. The ultimate owner is based in US. Foreign control undermines part of the certainty a European headquarters offers.

k6 (Grafana Labs) hosts data in EU, US. Exactly what stays within the EU — and what does not — is defined by the vendor's data processing agreement and sub-processor list, not by a setting you control yourself; check those documents for the precise scope, including backups, logs and support access.

k6 (Grafana Labs) is open source. You can audit the source code, self-host the software and keep the encryption keys under your own control. Switching is easier because data and software are not tied to a single party.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs k6 (Grafana Labs) together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to k6 (Grafana Labs)?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to k6 (Grafana Labs) include aqua cloud, BTC Embedded Systems and Cantata. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to k6 (Grafana Labs)?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to k6 (Grafana Labs) include Cerberus Testing and Gatling. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is k6 (Grafana Labs) GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

k6 (Grafana Labs) is headquartered in SE (EU) and hosts data in EU, US. It is also open-source, so you can self-host it. That makes k6 (Grafana Labs) an EU-sovereign choice in its own right; the EU alternatives on this page are comparable European tools.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 9, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Digital sovereignty in Testing & QA

Testing & QA: Software testing, test automation, browser testing and quality assurance. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

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8 European alternatives to k6 (Grafana Labs) — GDPR-compliant & EU-hosted · EU Sovereignty Score