diff --git a/pkg/tsdb/cloudwatch/cloudwatch.go b/pkg/tsdb/cloudwatch/cloudwatch.go
index 6d68e6902e5..f6d023ce14c 100644
--- a/pkg/tsdb/cloudwatch/cloudwatch.go
+++ b/pkg/tsdb/cloudwatch/cloudwatch.go
@@ -546,6 +546,10 @@ func formatAlias(query *CloudWatchQuery, stat string, dimensions map[string]stri
 		return in
 	})
 
+	if string(result) == "" {
+		return metricName + "_" + stat
+	}
+
 	return string(result)
 }