Guides

Getting started

• How to monitor cron jobs (and get alerted when they don't run)
  Cron is silent when a job doesn't run. Here is how to detect missed, failed and hung cron jobs with a heartbeat URL.
• Heartbeat monitoring vs uptime monitoring: what each one catches
  Uptime checks ask 'is it answering?'. Heartbeats ask 'did it run?'. Why scheduled jobs need the second kind, and when you need both.
• Get alerted before an SSL/TLS certificate expires
  Auto-renewal fails silently more often than you think. Monitor certificate expiry and chain validity, and get warned days ahead.

Platforms and schedulers

• Monitoring Kubernetes CronJobs for missed and failed runs
  Kubernetes CronJobs can silently stop scheduling. Add a heartbeat to each CronJob to detect missed, failed and stuck runs.
• Monitoring systemd timers: alert when a timer job fails or stops running
  systemd timers fail quietly too. Use ExecStartPost and OnFailure to report success and failure to a heartbeat monitor.
• Monitoring cron jobs in Docker containers
  Cron inside containers fails silently: no daemon, missing environment variables, logs nobody reads. Here's how to catch it.
• Monitoring scheduled AWS Lambda functions (EventBridge)
  Know when a scheduled Lambda didn't run, timed out or threw, without wiring up CloudWatch alarms for every function.
• Monitoring GitHub Actions scheduled workflows (cron) for missed and failed runs
  GitHub Actions schedules can be delayed, skipped or disabled automatically. Add a heartbeat so you notice when a scheduled workflow stops running.
• Monitoring GitLab CI scheduled pipelines
  Get alerted when a GitLab scheduled pipeline fails or quietly stops running, with a few lines of .gitlab-ci.yml.
• Monitoring Windows Task Scheduler jobs with a heartbeat
  Alert when a Windows scheduled task fails or stops running, using a small PowerShell wrapper that reports the exit code.

Frameworks and languages

• Monitoring Rails scheduled jobs (whenever, sidekiq-cron, Solid Queue)
  Get alerted when a Rails scheduled job fails, hangs or silently stops running, whether it is scheduled by cron or by a job queue.
• Monitoring the Laravel scheduler and scheduled commands
  Get alerted when a Laravel scheduled command fails or the scheduler itself stops running, using pingOnSuccess and pingOnFailure.
• Monitoring Node.js scheduled jobs (node-cron, BullMQ)
  Get alerted when a Node.js scheduled task fails, hangs or stops running after a crash or deploy.
• Monitoring Python scheduled jobs (scripts, Django commands, APScheduler)
  A small, dependency-free heartbeat for Python jobs: get alerted when a script, Django management command or APScheduler job fails or stops running.
• Monitoring Celery beat periodic tasks
  Celery beat can stop scheduling without errors. Send a heartbeat from each periodic task, and alert on failures with Celery signals.
• Monitoring Go scheduled jobs (robfig/cron and plain cron)
  A small heartbeat helper for Go: get alerted when a scheduled function fails, panics, hangs or stops running.

Backups

• How to know your backups actually ran
  Backups that silently stopped are the classic disaster. Monitor backup jobs with heartbeats, check the output size, and alert on failure.
• Monitoring restic and borg backups: alert on failed or missing snapshots
  A backup script that stops running is the classic silent failure. Wrap restic or borg with a heartbeat that reports exit codes and output.

Comparisons

• Cron job monitoring tools compared: Healthchecks.io, Cronitor, Dead Man's Snitch and CronPup
  An honest side-by-side of heartbeat/cron monitoring services: free tiers, pricing at 50 and 300 monitors, and where each one is the better pick.
• A Healthchecks.io alternative: when CronPup fits, and when it doesn't
  Comparing CronPup with Healthchecks.io for cron and heartbeat monitoring: price at 50 and 300 monitors, TLS checks, and when to stay with Healthchecks.io.
• A Cronitor alternative for cron and heartbeat monitoring
  Comparing CronPup with Cronitor for job monitoring: per-monitor vs flat pricing, scope, and when Cronitor is the better choice.
• A Dead Man's Snitch alternative
  Comparing CronPup with Dead Man's Snitch for heartbeat monitoring: tiers, cron schedules, run tracking, and TLS checks.

More

• Better Stack heartbeats vs CronPup: an honest comparison
  Better Stack is an incident-management platform with heartbeat monitoring built in. CronPup does only job heartbeats and TLS expiry, at flat prices. Here is when each fits.
• Cron job not running? A checklist (and how to find out next time)
  The common reasons a cron job silently doesn't run: PATH, %, permissions, timezones, missing newline, the wrong crontab. Plus how to get alerted.
• Monitoring Apache Airflow DAGs with a dead man's switch
  Airflow can't alert you if the scheduler itself is down or a DAG stops being scheduled. Add an external heartbeat per critical DAG.
• Alert when a scheduled Jenkins job doesn't run
  Jenkins tells you when a build fails, not when a timer-triggered job never starts. Add a heartbeat to catch both.
• Monitoring Spring @Scheduled tasks
  A @Scheduled method stops when the app is down, the thread pool is stuck or the bean isn't loaded, and nothing logs it. Add a heartbeat.
• Is Heroku Scheduler running your job? How to know
  Heroku Scheduler is best-effort: Heroku says jobs can be skipped or run twice. Monitor each scheduled job with a heartbeat.
• Monitoring Google Cloud Scheduler and Cloud Run jobs
  Cloud Scheduler retries and logs, but nobody is told when a job stops being triggered or never finishes. Add an end-to-end heartbeat.
• WP-Cron not running? Monitor WordPress scheduled tasks
  WP-Cron only runs when someone visits the site, so low-traffic sites miss scheduled posts and backups. Use a real cron and a heartbeat.