Overview
Memcached is a high-performance, distributed memory caching system used to speed up dynamic web applications by reducing database load. Xitoring's Memcached integration monitors cache performance, memory utilization, connection states, and eviction rates — ensuring your caching layer operates at peak efficiency.
What Can It Monitor?
- Cache Hit Ratio — Percentage of requests served from cache vs misses
- Get Hits / Get Misses — Counts of successful and failed cache lookups
- Used Memory — RAM consumed by cached items
- Max Memory — Configured memory limit
- Current Connections — Active client connections
- Total Connections — Cumulative connection count since start
- Evictions — Items removed from cache due to memory pressure
- Current Items — Number of items currently stored in cache
- Bytes Read / Written — Network throughput
- CMD Get / CMD Set — Rate of get and set operations
- Uptime — How long the Memcached instance has been running
Prerequisites
- Memcached installed and running on your server
- Xitogent agent installed
- Memcached stats endpoint accessible locally (default port:
11211)
No additional configuration or plugins are required.
How to Activate the Integration
Run the Xitogent CLI:
xitogent integrate
Select Memcached from the list of available integrations. When prompted, provide the Memcached host and port (default: 127.0.0.1:11211).
Xitogent connects and begins collecting statistics automatically.
Setting Up Triggers
Available trigger parameters:
- Cache Hit Ratio
- Used Memory / Max Memory
- Current Connections
- Evictions
- Current Items
- CMD Get / CMD Set rates
- Bytes Read / Written
Navigate to Triggers on your server page, select Memcached, choose a metric, set your threshold, and configure notification channels.
Tips
- Monitor Cache Hit Ratio — it should stay above 90% for effective caching
- Set alerts on Evictions — frequent evictions mean you need more memory
- Track Used Memory relative to Max Memory to plan capacity
- Watch Current Connections to detect connection leaks from application code
- A dropping Current Items count with stable traffic may indicate memory pressure