Proactive Uptime Monitoring Tool

Q: Can PRTG monitor uptime across multiple locations or remote sites?

Yes, through remote probes — lightweight components installed at remote sites that report back to the central PRTG server. Each probe monitors local devices independently, so distributed monitoring works even across network boundaries or limited WAN connections. This is the standard approach for organizations running infrastructure across multiple offices, branches, or sites.

Know when something goes down before your users do, across your entire infrastructure.

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PRODUCT OVERVIEW

What should an uptime monitoring tool actually cover?

A real uptime monitoring tool polls devices and services continuously using the right protocols, delivers alerts the moment something drops, and keeps historical data so you can report on it later. The full stack needs coverage: servers, network devices, VMs, and web-facing endpoints, all in one place. Paessler PRTG does exactly that, from one install, with one dashboard.

Supported technologies: Servers (Windows/Linux) · Routers · Switches · Firewalls · VMs (VMware/Hyper-V) · Cloud services (AWS, Azure) · DNS · SMTP · TCP endpoints · HTTP/HTTPS · SSL certificates

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PRTG is compatible with all major vendors, products, and systems

Uptime Monitoring That Covers Your Entire Infrastructure

Get Alerted First, Every Time

PRTG continuously polls your devices and services and sends a notification the moment something stops responding, so the right person gets alerted before anyone else notices. Alert routing is configurable per device, group, or severity level, which means the network team gets network alerts and the server team gets server alerts, not everyone gets everything. If the first notification doesn't reach anyone, escalation contacts can be set to kick in after a defined delay. The result is a structured alert chain that works without manual coordination.

Configurable polling intervals per device or sensor
Notifications via email, SMS, push notification, and webhooks (compatible with Slack, PagerDuty, and similar services)
Alert routing by device, group, location, or severity
Maintenance windows to suppress alerts during planned work
iOS and Android apps for on-call alerting on the go

One tool for a mixed stack

Windows servers, Cisco switches, Linux systems, VMware, a few things in Azure. Keeping all of that in a single monitoring solution is the hard part. PRTG handles it through auto-discovery and device templates for major vendors. No extra software to install on monitored devices, minimal manual entry. Also auto-discovery runs on a schedule, so devices added to a monitored IP range get picked up automatically without anyone touching the configuration. One dashboard, no blind spots from tool fragmentation.

Covers servers, network devices, VMs, and cloud services from one install
Auto-discovery scans IP ranges and adds devices without manual entry
Preconfigured sensors for Cisco, Dell, HPE, VMware, AWS, Azure, plus integrations with your existing workflows via API and webhooks
REST Custom sensor for querying SaaS and custom API endpoints (requires REST configuration file)
Extend coverage with custom sensors (Python, PowerShell, PRTG API) where native sensors don't cover your environment. Requires scripting.

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Start monitoring your infrastructure in minutes. No professional services, no complex configuration, no risk.

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PRODUCT OVERVIEW

Availability history that's actually there when you need it

PRTG logs sensor states over time with timestamps, based on configured scanning intervals, starting when a sensor becomes active. No separate logging configuration, no manual export schedule. That gives you the raw data for post-mortems, SLA documentation, troubleshooting, and incident management without anyone manually tracking anything. Availability records are there on demand, whether for a routine management review, an audit, or an incident debrief. The data is structured, timestamped, and ready whenever it's needed.

Full sensor state history logged automatically with timestamps
Per-device and per-group availability reports
PRTG SLA Reporter for structured SLA documentation (separate extension, historical reporting only, not real-time SLA alerting)
Exportable data for root cause analysis in external tools
Scheduled reports for periodic infrastructure health reviews

Spot Trends Before They Become Problems

A device that reboots every three weeks looks like a one-off until you have the trend data. PRTG stores response times, latency, packet loss, and availability continuously. Thresholds work in two tiers: a warning level fires before the metric hits the error level, giving you an early signal while there's still time to act. That's how you catch a metric drifting consistently before it becomes an incident, with enough lead time to investigate and resolve it on your terms.

Continuous historical data for all monitored metrics
Configurable warning and error thresholds per sensor
Latency and response time trend graphs
Data export to optimize capacity planning in external tools
Scheduled reports for identifying recurring performance bottlenecks

How PRTG Monitors Uptime

PRTG covers device reachability, system uptime, service availability, and web health checks through purpose-built sensors. Learn more about how these sensors help you achieve your uptime goals.

Device reachability

The Ping v2 sensor sends ICMP echo requests and measures response time, packet loss, and min/max ping time per cycle. This is the most direct method for uptime checks: returns a clear up or down status every poll. Also useful for tracking latency trends over time, not just live status.

Network device uptime

The SNMP Uptime v2 sensor reads the sysUpTime OID directly from SNMP-capable devices: routers, switches, firewalls, and any endpoint exposing SNMP v1/v2c/v3. Reports the time since the device's last reboot, and PRTG tracks sensor downtime separately in graphs and reports. No agent required on the target device. Works across a wide range of vendors, which in practice means most things you already have.

Windows server uptime

The Windows System Uptime Sensor connects via WMI or Windows performance counters to report uptime and downtime on Windows servers. No agent installation needed. Works on domain-joined and standalone systems.

TCP Port Checks

The Port sensor and Port v2 sensor check whether a specific TCP port is open and accepting connections. That covers SMTP (port 25/587), DNS (port 53), RDP, and custom application ports, confirming not just that a device is reachable, but that service functionality is intact. It is useful for website monitoring, mail server checks, and general endpoint availability.

Web Certificate Health

The SSL Certificate sensor tracks certificate validity and alerts before expiry, so an expired certificate doesn't cause surprise website downtime. HTTP sensors (HTTP, HTTP v2, HTTP Advanced) check website availability, HTTP status codes, and response time. Content matching is available in HTTP Advanced for more granular website monitoring. For full page speed measurement including all page resources, the HTTP Full Web Page sensor covers that.

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Uptime Monitoring: With and Without PRTG

Capability	Without PRTG Without PRTG	With PRTG With PRTG
Downtime detection	Without PRTG User reports it via helpdesk	With PRTG Detected within one polling cycle, notification sent automatically
Multi-protocol coverage	Without PRTG Separate tool per device type	With PRTG SNMP, WMI, ICMP, TCP: one installation
Availability history	Without PRTG Manual extraction from logs or tickets	With PRTG Stored automatically, reportable per device or group
Alert routing	Without PRTG Manual call/email chains	With PRTG Configured per device, severity, or schedule
New device coverage	Without PRTG Manually added to each tool	With PRTG Auto-discovery scans IP range and adds sensors
Reporting and workflows	Without PRTG Manual, disconnected	With PRTG Automate reports, export data, scheduled delivery

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“I would recommend PRTG because it has helped us significantly improve service uptime by highlighting important alerts that would otherwise result in a system failure or service disruption if action was not taken. Thanks to PRTG, we can ensure that The Ritz London’s network and IT systems are five-star, just like the hotel.”

Richard Isted, IT Manager

The Ritz London

Ultimately, people do better when they focus on the solution, not the tool. This is the mantra we live by at Skyscanner. Without PRTG, we’d still be spending half a day or more on monitoring our internal tools.

Barry Kelly, Systems Engineer

Skyscanner

Adopting PRTG has been like going from being in the dark to being in the light. Before, we had limited visibility into what was happening in the infrastructure and in the network. Now, however, thanks to the comprehensive dashboard and real-time notifications, we receive constant updates on the status of facilities and services, and our way of working has gone from passive to proactive.

Luca Meneghesso, senior IT infrastructure and security specialist

Banca Profilo

Paessler PRTG Network Monitor licenses & pricing

Choose the PRTG Network Monitor subscription that's best for you.

License Name	Price	License Details	Get started	Pricing Details
PRTG 500	^$200	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 50 devices
PRTG 1000	^$358	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 100 devices
PRTG 2500	^$742	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 250 devices
PRTG 5000	^$1,300	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 500 devices
PRTG 10000	^$1,642	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 1000 devices

Over 100,000 Customers Worldwide Love Paessler

Uptime Monitoring: Frequently Asked Questions

What's the difference between uptime monitoring and availability monitoring?

Practically speaking, they mean the same thing: is this device, service, or endpoint reachable, or not? Uptime monitoring refers to continuous polling for status. Availability monitoring can extend to include uptime percentages, SLA reporting, and historical trends, and in PRTG, both run on the same sensor infrastructure. The uptime data feeds directly into availability reports, so there's no separate setup for that.

Which protocols does PRTG use for uptime checks?

ICMP via the Ping v2 sensor, SNMP via the SNMP Uptime v2 sensor, WMI via the Windows System Uptime Sensor, and TCP via the Port and Port v2 sensors. Dedicated SMTP and DNS sensors handle service-level checks; HTTP and HTTPS sensors cover website availability. Most work out of the box once you add a device and configure the relevant credentials.

Can PRTG monitor uptime across multiple locations or remote sites?

Yes, through remote probes, lightweight components installed at remote sites that report back to the central PRTG server. Each probe monitors local devices independently, so distributed monitoring works even across network boundaries or limited WAN connections. This is the standard approach for organizations running infrastructure across multiple offices, branches, or sites, and it works well for that.

Can PRTG monitor SaaS services and cloud endpoints for availability?

PRTG has native sensors for AWS (via CloudWatch) and Azure. For other SaaS services and custom API endpoints, the REST Custom sensor can monitor REST APIs by querying an endpoint and mapping JSON/XML responses to channels. This typically requires a REST configuration file and may require additional setup depending on authentication and response structure. For simpler checks, HTTP and HTTPS sensors work against any web-accessible endpoint without additional configuration.

What does the free plan include for uptime monitoring?

100 sensors, no time limit, no credit card required. That covers uptime monitoring across your most critical devices, services, and endpoints. Pricing scales by sensor count as your environment grows, with no feature gating between tiers.

How is PRTG different from tools like UptimeRobot?

UptimeRobot is a hosted uptime monitoring service built around external website checks from the cloud. PRTG installs in your own environment and covers servers, network devices, VMs, cloud services, and websites from a single platform. Where UptimeRobot tells you a URL is down, PRTG can tell you which device, service, or port caused it. SNMP, WMI, ICMP, TCP, HTTP, API monitoring, historical reporting: it's a broader infrastructure monitoring solution for teams who need visibility into what's affecting user experience, not just whether a URL responds.