OneAgent network connection monitoring

• Latest Dynatrace
• Reference
• 3-min read
• Published May 07, 2026

OneAgent version 1.337+

OneAgent network connection monitoring collects network flow data at regular intervals via its network module or NetTracer and stores it in Grail.

Each flow describes traffic between two endpoints:

Unlike network metrics, which aggregate connection data per process, OneAgent network connection monitoring preserves individual connection details—including source and destination addresses, ports, packet counts, and RTT.

Collected data is stored as generic events in Grail in the default_network_flows bucket. These events don't trigger Davis problems, but can be used for supplemental analysis.

Supported platforms

Settings

To configure network flow collection, go to Settings > Collect and capture > Infrastructure > Network connection monitoring and turn on Enable OneAgent network connection monitoring.

Configuration options include:

IP filter

The IP filter controls which connections are included based on the remote IP address.

Reported connections

The reported connections setting determines which connections are included based on their characteristics.

Aggregation

Over the aggregation interval, multiple sessions between the same endpoints are combined into a single flow record. For example, with a 1-minute interval, 10 connections from the same client to the same server IP and port produce one flow record with network_flow.tcp.sessions.new set to 10. Packet counts are summed and round-trip time (RTT) is averaged across the interval.

Query network flows

You can explore network flow data using DQL in Notebooks and Dashboards. All network flows collected by OneAgent share the same pipeline source identifier.

The following example retrieves all network flow records:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}

To filter by host, add a host filter:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}
| filter dt.smartscape.host == toSmartscapeId("<host-entity-id>")

Replace <host-entity-id> with the entity ID of the host you want to analyze.

The following example retrieves the top hosts by total packets received:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}
| summarize total_packets = sum(network_flow.packets.rx), by: {dt.smartscape.host}
| sort total_packets desc
| limit 10

To rank source IPs by outbound traffic volume:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}
| summarize bytes_tx = sum(network_flow.bytes.tx), by: {network_flow.source.address}
| sort bytes_tx desc
| limit 25

To identify the busiest source-to-destination pairs by packet count:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}
| summarize total_packets = sum(network_flow.packets.rx), by:{network_flow.source.address,network_flow.destination.address}
| sort total_packets desc
| limit 50

To find flows with the highest average round-trip time:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}
| summarize avg_rtt = avg(network_flow.tcp.rtt) , by: {network_flow.source.address, network_flow.destination.address}
| filter isNotNull(avg_rtt)
| sort avg_rtt desc
| limit 50

To see which destination ports carry the most flows:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}
| summarize flows = count() , by: network_flow.destination.port
| sort flows desc
| limit 20

To narrow down flows that experienced session timeouts or resets:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}
| filter network_flow.tcp.sessions.timeout > 0 or network_flow.tcp.sessions.reset > 0

To surface connections with the highest retransmission rates:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}
| summarize { retrans_rx = sum(network_flow.packets.retransmitted.rx), retrans_tx = sum(network_flow.packets.retransmitted.tx),
  total_rx = sum(network_flow.packets.rx), total_tx = sum(network_flow.packets.tx)},
  by: {network_flow.source.address, network_flow.destination.address}
| filterOut total_rx == 0 or total_tx == 0
| fieldsAdd perc_rx = retrans_rx / total_rx, perc_tx = retrans_tx / total_tx,
  perc_retrans = (retrans_rx + retrans_tx) / (total_rx + total_tx)
| sort perc_retrans desc

To rank source-destination pairs by number of new TCP connections established:

fetch events, bucket:{"default_network_flows"}
| summarize new_connections = sum(network_flow.tcp.sessions.new), by:{network_flow.source.address,network_flow.destination.address}
| sort new_connections desc
| limit 50

Network flow

Network flow fields

Fields relevant for network flows.

network_flow.network.type has the following list of well-known values. If one of them applies, then the respective value MUST be used, otherwise a custom value MAY be used.