Plans & capabilities
Understand the three independent capabilities (Uptime, On-call, and Status pages) and how their plans and the bundle discount work.
Three capabilities, priced independently
HowlOps is not sold as a single all-in-one tier. Instead it offers three independent capabilities, and you buy a plan for each capability you actually need:
- Uptime: active monitoring (HTTP, ping, SSL, keyword, multi-region).
- On-call: schedules, escalation policies, external alert ingestion, SMS/voice paging.
- Status pages: public status pages for your customers.
Each capability has its own free tier and its own paid plans. You can stay on Free for one capability and pay for another; they are billed separately and combined on one invoice. All limits are enforced at runtime from server-side configuration; they are not hardcoded in the client.
For current pricing and exact quota numbers, see the pricing page.
Uptime
| Plan | Price (monthly) | Monitors | Min. check interval | Regions | Notable |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | 50 | 120s | Single | SSL, keyword, domain-expiry |
| S | $15 | 100 | 60s | Multi-region | Multi-region, screenshots, 30-day retention |
| M | $39 | 500 | 30s | Multi-region | Faster checks, more monitors, 90-day retention |
| L | $99 | 2000 | 15s | Multi-region | Fastest checks, highest quotas, 365-day retention |
Every paid Uptime plan (S, M, L) includes multi-region probing and screenshot monitoring. The plans differ in monitor capacity, check interval, and history retention, not in those features.
On-call
| Plan | Price | Includes |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | Basic schedules and a single escalation policy |
| Paid | $12 per active responder / month | Everything below |
External alert ingestion — receiving alerts from Prometheus / Alertmanager, Grafana, Datadog, and CloudWatch — is available on all plans, including Free On-call.
On-call paid is metered: you are only billed for responders who actually rotated in a given month, not for every team member. Paid On-call adds:
- More on-call schedules and escalation steps.
- SMS paging: 100 messages/month included, then $0.05 each.
- Voice paging: 50 calls/month included, then $0.25 each.
Status pages
| Plan | Price (monthly) | Notable |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | Public page, uptime bars, email subscribers |
| Starter | $5 | Higher limits |
| Pro | $9 | Custom domain, white-label, custom CSS, password protection |
Custom domains, white-labelling (remove "Powered by"), custom CSS, and password-protected pages all require Status Pro.
Bundle discount
When you buy paid plans for more than one capability, a bundle discount of roughly 23% is applied automatically to the combined subtotal. There is no separate "Standard", "Premium", or "Enterprise" plan to buy; you compose the product from the capabilities above.
Security baseline (SSO / SAML)
SSO / SAML 2.0 is a security baseline, not a premium add-on. It is available on any paid plan, that is, as soon as you hold at least one paid capability (Uptime S+, paid On-call, or Status Starter+). See Configure SAML SSO.
Feature flags
Some features are gated by the capability plan you hold, evaluated server-side. Attempting to use a feature above your current plan returns an HTTP 402 (Payment Required) or a UI message prompting you to upgrade the relevant capability. You will never be charged silently; upgrade is always an explicit step under Settings → Plan.
Upgrade and downgrade
- Upgrade (buy a capability, or move Uptime S → M, Status Starter → Pro) takes effect immediately. New limits and features are available at once.
- Downgrade takes effect at the end of the current billing period. Resources that exceed the lower plan's limits are not deleted; they are paused until you either remove excess items or upgrade again.
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