Setting Up Uptime Monitoring for Your Website
Uptime monitoring is your first line of defense. Until basic HTTP checks are in place, all other monitoring is meaningless — you might not know your site is down until a customer calls.
The task goes beyond "ping the homepage" — cover critical points: API, admin panel, health endpoint, CDN.
Self-Hosted: Uptime Kuma
Uptime Kuma — free, self-hosted tool with simple UI, many check types and notification options.
# docker-compose.yml
services:
uptime-kuma:
image: louislam/uptime-kuma:1
volumes:
- uptime-kuma:/var/lib/uptime-kuma
ports:
- "3001:3001"
restart: unless-stopped
Configure checks in web UI (http://localhost:3001):
- HTTP(S) — homepage, API endpoints, health checks
- Keyword check — verify response contains expected text
- TCP ping — database port connectivity
- DNS check — nameserver availability
- PING — server reachability
Notifications: Telegram, Slack, email, Discord, webhook.
Paid Services
Pingdom / Uptime Robot — external monitoring from multiple locations. Catches issues visible only from outside your network.
Healthchecks.io — monitoring cron jobs. If scheduled task doesn't ping within expected interval — alert.
Timeline
Basic uptime monitoring with 5-10 checks and notifications: 1 day. Adding synthetic tests and geographical checks: 2-3 days.