Best uptime monitoring tools: 8 services compared by free plan and price

Best uptime monitoring tools: the picks

For a small business website, the best uptime monitoring tool is UptimeRobot: 50 monitors on its Free plan, then Solo at $13 a month, billed monthly, from UptimeRobot's US pricing page as captured on September 29, 2026. Better Stack (formerly Better Uptime) suits teams that need on-call phone alerts, and HetrixTools gives free SSL and domain checks.

We compared eight services on what a small business site needs: free plan size, check interval, SSL and domain expiry, status pages, alert channels and an entry price on one billing basis. The picks come from each vendor's pricing and documentation pages as read on 7 October 2026, not from running the tools ourselves. The vendors price on different bases (monitors, bundles of checks, responder seats), so the table sets monthly billing beside monthly billing.

UptimeRobot, Better Stack, StatusCake, HetrixTools, Pulsetic and Site24x7 each have a free plan; Pingdom offers a trial instead.

Best for a free start: UptimeRobot, HetrixTools and Pulsetic

UptimeRobot. Its Free plan holds 50 monitors at 5-minute checks and, per its pricing card, needs no credit card. It runs HTTP, port, ping and keyword monitors, one status page on an UptimeRobot address, and email and app alerts. Per its Terms, the Free plan may be used for business.

The limit is SSL: certificate and domain-expiry reminders start on Solo, $13 a month billed monthly or $12 a month billed annually ($144 a year), which also brings checks as short as 60 seconds. Team is $46 a month, billed monthly, for 100 monitors, checks as short as 30 seconds and 3 login seats. See best free uptime monitoring tools for every free plan.

HetrixTools. Its Free plan gives 15 uptime monitors checked every minute, with SSL validity and expiration, domain expiration and status pages on every plan. The limit: free users log in every 90 days and get 4 of its 12 locations. Professional is $9.95 a month, billed monthly, for 30 monitors, 6 of 12 locations and 25 SMS a month. The page shows no trial and no refund terms.

Pulsetic. Its Free plan allows 10 monitors, heartbeats or domains at 5-minute checks, with SSL checks and 3 status pages. The free status pages leave out customization, incident updates, scheduled maintenance and subscriber notifications. Solo is $9 a month, billed monthly, with 60-second checks, 5 regions and 30+ SMS or call alerts. Pulsetic refunds the first order if you ask within 20 days, and renewals are not refundable.

Better Stack for on-call alerts, Pingdom for real user monitoring

Better Stack. Its responder license, $34 a month billed monthly or $29 a month billed annually, includes unlimited phone call and SMS alerts with on-call and incident management. The Free plan is 10 monitors and heartbeats, which are check-ins from cron jobs, and 1 status page, with Slack and email alerts. The limit: SSL and domain expiration alerts need a paid plan, and each extra status page is $15 a month, billed monthly. Better Stack lists a 60-day money-back guarantee.

Pingdom. It fits a buyer who wants real user monitoring from the same vendor as the uptime checks. It has no free plan, only a trial of unstated length. The entry plan is $18 a month, billed monthly, or $16.50 a month, billed annually ($198 a year), for 10 uptime checks, 1 advanced check and 50 SMS, with unlimited users.

Its card lists email and SMS alerting and names no on-call scheduling, so it is not an on-call pick.

Best for many locations: Site24x7

Site24x7's Web Uptime plan lists 25 websites, 1-minute polling, 32 monitoring locations and 3 status pages for $10 a month, or $9 a month paid annually. Transaction monitors start on Web Perf, at $39 a month or $36 a month paid annually, with 40 websites, 8 transaction monitors, 8 locations and 10 status pages.

Site24x7 also offers a free plan for uptime of up to 50 resources and a 30-day trial that asks for no credit card; its pages name no check interval or SSL checks for the free plan.

Best for many SSL and domain monitors: StatusCake

StatusCake's Superior plan lists 100 uptime monitors at 1 minute, 50 SSL monitors, 50 domain monitors and 75 SMS credits for $24.49 a month, billed monthly, or $20.41 a month, billed annually. Business is $79.99 a month, billed monthly, for 300 monitors at 30 seconds. Its Free plan is only 3 monitors at 15-minute tests, HTTP(S) only, and it offers a 7-day free trial. No monitoring-location figure is documented for StatusCake.

Best to self-host: Uptime Kuma

Uptime Kuma is free MIT-licensed software with 20-second intervals and multiple status pages. It has no software fee, but you pay for and run the server, with Docker or Node.js 20.4 or later and updates by hand: pull the new image and start the container again on the same volume. The project offers no hosted plan, and help comes through GitHub Issues and Reddit.

Of UptimeRobot, Better Stack and Uptime Kuma, pick Better Stack when a person needs phone alerts, Uptime Kuma when a server is already running, and UptimeRobot when 50 hosted monitors with email alerts are enough. Uptime monitor pricing sets the paid plans side by side, UptimeRobot alternatives picks one by need, and the UptimeRobot review covers its limits.