Pausing monitors during maintenance or deploys
Each monitor exposes a paused flag in the UI. Pausing is meant for controlled maintenance: scans stop alerting while you work, and you resume when the change is complete. This guide contrasts pause with monitoring windows, incidents, and alert contacts so teams pick the right control.
What pause does in the product
The dashboard renders paused monitors with a dedicated badge and styling, and the detail screen offers a pause/resume button backed by POST `/site/<id>/pause`. While paused, the monitor should not contribute fresh up/down flips the same way an active monitor would—use it when humans intentionally stop caring about alerts for a window.
Pause vs monitoring schedule windows
Monitoring windows limit when synthetic checks run but keep the monitor conceptually active. Pausing is a stronger operational switch: you use it when work is happening and any alert would be noise. Pick windows for nightly quiet hours; pick pause for deploy freezes or vendor maintenance.
Pause vs muting alert contacts
Alert contacts are shared across monitors. Pausing targets a single monitor without rerouting every other service that uses the same email or webhook contact.
How incidents relate
Incidents still exist in the database while you pause; historical rows remain visible on `/incidents` after login. Pausing prevents new noisy transitions—it does not rewrite past outage history.
Team coordination
Use your runbook: note who paused which monitor, when to resume, and link to the maintenance ticket. SitePuls stores the paused boolean on the monitor row so anyone with access can see state from the dashboard.
Combining with SLA exports
SLA CSV downloads still reflect historical scans. If you need SLAs to ignore maintenance, combine procedural pauses with your change calendar rather than expecting automatic SLA exclusions.
API or heartbeat monitors
The same pause control exists per monitor record regardless of monitor type in the schema—verify behaviour in-app for REST or heartbeat flows you rely on.
Next steps
Practice on staging: pause a low-risk monitor, confirm dashboard badges, resume, then align with schedule windows for recurring quiet hours.
What you can verify with SitePuls here
- Monitor detail exposes pause/resume backed by POST `/site/<id>/pause`, persisting the `paused` boolean on the Site row shown in dashboard badges.
- Monitoring windows only skip scheduled synthetic checks; pause is an operator switch that silences a specific monitor during maintenance without changing window_mode fields.
- Incidents remain queryable on `/incidents` after login; pausing reduces new churn but does not erase historical outage rows tied to the monitor.
- Alert contacts stay attached while paused—pause targets one monitor, unlike muting a shared contact that would affect every linked service.
Where incident alerts can go
- Email addresses saved as alert contacts receive messages when incidents open or resolve (according to your notification settings).
- Telegram notifications via the SitePuls bot after you link a chat to an alert contact (including the bot /start flow for pending contacts).
- HTTPS webhooks that receive JSON with event type, monitor identifiers, status, timestamp, optional incident id, and a short message for generic integrations.
- Slack-compatible incoming-webhook formatting: alert contacts can use a dedicated mode so payloads match Slack-style incoming webhook expectations.
FAQ
Does pause delete history?
No. Check history and incident records remain; pause only changes forward behaviour.
Can I pause every monitor at once?
The UI issues pause per monitor ID; bulk automation would require your own tooling against the API or repeated manual actions.
Will paused monitors appear on public status pages?
Public pages only include monitors you attach to the status page configuration; paused monitors still exist but read the public status guide for how badges render.
Is pause the same as deleting a monitor?
Deletion removes configuration entirely. Pause keeps configuration and history while silencing new work.
Do I still need alert contacts while paused?
Contacts remain configured; they simply have fewer new incidents while the monitor is intentionally quiet.
Can guests pause monitors?
Pause controls live in authenticated monitor management screens—public marketing pages only describe the behaviour.
How does this interact with smart alerts?
Smart alerts only evaluate active HTTP scans with enough history. Pausing stops new scans from contributing until you resume.
Where do I configure windows instead?
Use the monitoring schedule windows guide for weekday/time masks that skip scans without flipping the paused flag.