Best uptime monitoring free tier for indie developers with multiple side projects (honest 2026)

You juggle five to fifteen side projects, and every listicle shouts "UptimeRobot Free: 50 monitors!" That sounds perfect until a micro-SaaS earns its first dollar and UptimeRobot bans commercial use on Free, or you need a status page per revenue product while the free tier offers only one. Below: honest math on monitor count vs status-page workflow, a straight UptimeRobot vs StillOnline table, and when a two-tool stack beats one free tier.

Quick answer

Fifty monitors is not fifty products if each needs its own public status page. Per UptimeRobot pricing, UptimeRobot Free ($0, 5 min, 50 monitors) bans revenue sites since late 2024. StillOnline Free ($0, 5 min, 1 URL) ships an auto status page and allows B2B use. Better Stack Free: 10 monitors, 3 min. Pulsetic Free: 10 monitors. Many indie devs pair UptimeRobot for hobby volume with StillOnline for one paying flagship. Upgrade StillOnline to Pro at $9/mo for a second revenue URL or all three alert channels.

Uptime monitoring is an outside robot that pings your site on a timer — like a friend texting "still up?" every few minutes. A status page is the public scoreboard customers check during incidents. Free tiers differ on URL limits, commercial-use rules, and whether status pages are bundled or sold as add-ons.

If you ship on Vercel, Railway, or Fly.io without a dedicated SRE, you probably care about transparency more than 50 parallel pings. That is the gap most "best free tier" listicles miss: they rank monitor count, not the workflow of a revenue side project. See also uptime monitoring without DevOps.

Monitor count vs status-page workflow

A monitor is one scheduled ping to one URL. A project (StillOnline model) bundles checks plus an auto public status page. UptimeRobot Free gives 50 monitors but one basic status page — fine for a personal grid, awkward when three revenue products each need a client-facing page.

Do: tag each side project as revenue vs hobby before picking a vendor. Do not: choose by headline monitor count without reading commercial-use rules.

Portfolio map:
Hobby repos → UptimeRobot Free → email ping
Flagship micro-SaaS → StillOnline Free → status page + Telegram
Second revenue URL → StillOnline Pro $9/mo

1. Step 1: Inventory prod, staging, and marketing URLs.
2. Step 2: Mark which products need a public status page.
3. Step 3: Check ToS for commercial use on Free.
4. Step 4: Match limits to real prod URLs, not someday ideas.
5. Step 5: Decide if one deep stack beats many shallow pings.

UptimeRobot 50 monitors vs StillOnline 1 URL (honest)

Vendor pricing, June 2026. Confirm before relying on Free for a paying product.

Verdict: UptimeRobot Free wins hobby monitor volume. StillOnline Free wins one revenue project needing a public status page without ToS risk. Head-to-head: StillOnline vs UptimeRobot.

Do: use UptimeRobot Free for zero-revenue URLs only. Do not: point Free at a SaaS that charges money.

Better Stack, Pulsetic, Freshping in 2026

Better Stack Free: 10 monitors, 3-minute checks, one status page — faster than UptimeRobot, fewer URLs per Better Stack docs. Pulsetic Free: 10 monitors, 5 minutes, multiple status pages on paper — useful for hobby grids without UptimeRobot's commercial ban.

Freshping is deprecated; teams migrated to UptimeRobot or paid tiers. See our Freshping migration guide.

Do: pick Better Stack when 10 URLs at 3 min beats 50 at 5 min. Do not: treat Pulsetic as a 50-monitor drop-in.

Two-tool stack (UR volume + SO status)

Solo founders often run UptimeRobot Free on ten hobby URLs while StillOnline Free guards the one micro-SaaS that earns money and shares a public status link in the footer.

Dual-tool flow:
UptimeRobot Free → 5–15 non-revenue URLs → email to you
StillOnline Free → prod /health → status page for customers → Telegram bot

UptimeRobot gives ping volume; StillOnline gives a B2B-safe status workflow on the URL that matters. Two dashboards, but no ToS violation on the project that pays. Point hobby monitors at staging or docs; keep prod on the vendor that allows commercial status pages. When a hobby repo later monetizes, move that URL off UptimeRobot Free before the first invoice — do not wait for a support ticket.

Do: separate hobby and revenue monitoring logically. Do not: run your Stripe-connected prod only on UptimeRobot Free.

Upgrade triggers to StillOnline Pro at $9/mo

StillOnline Free: one project, one URL, one alert channel, 5-minute checks, public status page. Pro at $9/mo: 10 projects, 10 URLs, private status, intervals down to 2 min, email + Telegram + Slack together.

Upgrade when: a second URL earns revenue; you need Telegram and Slack at once; B2B buyers want a private status link; you need API or MCP on Pro+. StillOnline Free locks the check interval at 5 minutes — fine for early traction, tight once customers expect sub-10-minute incident visibility. Pro unlocks 3- and 2-minute options without jumping to Ultimate ($29/mo) until you need up to 100 projects.

Start at stillonline.tech/app; caps at pricing. UptimeRobot Solo also starts near $9/mo if you only need more monitors — pick by workflow, not vanity metrics.

Do: upgrade when a second revenue URL ships. Do not: pay two vendors for the same prod URL without reason.

Do / Do not for side-project portfolios

Run this before wiring fifteen URLs into the wrong free account.

1. Do: Tag revenue vs hobby per project.
2. Do: Monitor a /health URL, not a heavy homepage.
3. Do: Keep commercial sites off UptimeRobot Free.
4. Do: Put the paying product on StillOnline Free until URL #2.
5. Do: Re-read indie SaaS monitoring picks when Stripe goes live.
6. Do not: Assume 50 monitors equals 50 status pages.
7. Do not: Ignore Freshping deprecation.
8. Do not: Stack three free tools on one prod URL without an on-call plan.

Do: treat free tiers as role-based tools. Do not: trust listicles that skip StillOnline when you need one honest status page for revenue.

What to do next

Inventory projects, fill the table, assign hobby volume to UptimeRobot Free (or Better Stack / Pulsetic at 10 monitors) and your revenue flagship to StillOnline Free. Second paying URL → budget Pro at $9/mo.

Related guides

• Freshping and UptimeRobot free tier guide — migration context and UR Free limits.
• StillOnline vs UptimeRobot — head-to-head when monitor count is not the whole story.
• Best uptime monitoring for indie SaaS 2026 — shortlist beyond free tiers.
• Agency multiple status pages — when each client product needs its own /s/... URL.
• Public vs private status page — when Pro private pages beat one public grid.
• Uptime monitoring without DevOps — ship checks before you compare vendors.

FAQ

Can I monitor ten side projects on StillOnline Free?

No — one project, one URL, one alert channel. Use UptimeRobot or Pulsetic Free for hobby volume, or StillOnline Pro ($9/mo) for ten URLs. See plan picker.

Is UptimeRobot Free legal for a revenue SaaS side project?

No. Since Oct–Dec 2024 UptimeRobot Free is personal, OSS, education, and nonprofit only per their help center. A side project with Stripe, ads, or client contracts counts as commercial. Move prod to Solo ($9/mo) or to StillOnline Free while you still have only one revenue URL.

Better Stack vs UptimeRobot Free for hobby volume?

UptimeRobot: 50 monitors, 5 min, no commercial URLs. Better Stack: 10 monitors, 3 min, startup-friendly ToS. Pick UR for ping count; Better Stack when 10 URLs at 3 min is enough.

When upgrade StillOnline to Pro at $9?

Second revenue URL, private status page, sub-5-minute checks, or Telegram plus Slack together. Free covers one flagship with a public status page.

When does UptimeRobot plus StillOnline make sense?

Many non-revenue hobby URLs plus one paying micro-SaaS. UptimeRobot watches the grid; StillOnline guards prod with a client-facing status page — common for agency portfolios.

Freshping alternative in 2026?

Deprecated. Migrate to UptimeRobot, StillOnline, Pulsetic, or Better Stack. See our migration guide.

Does UptimeRobot Free include Slack?

Free allows five integrations but Slack is not in the Free subset per vendor docs. StillOnline Free: one channel; Pro unlocks all three — Slack alerts.