Use case

DNS failure, TLS failure, and expired certificate should not all look the same.

DevOps and SRE teams need certificate checks that point to the right layer, send urgent warnings to watched systems, and leave enough detail for review after renewal or incident work.

Webhook docsTroubleshooting

Workspace control

Ownership stays visible

4 members

Teams keep monitors, roles, labels, and renewal context together when responsibility shifts.

OwnerCertificate Desk
Pending2 invites
AuditRoute changed 2h ago
Owner, admin, member, pending invite
Event review

Failure context, review state, and delivery attempts stay together.

Event review separates the certificate failure, payload summary, routed alert attempts, and human acknowledgement path.

01

Monitor the public paths that create incidents

Cover app, API, CDN, identity, docs, status, and customer-facing hostnames where a certificate problem can become a confusing customer failure.

  • Tag endpoints by service, environment, and responsible team.
  • Separate production from lower-risk environments so urgent channels stay useful.
  • Use certificate snapshots during CDN, load balancer, and hostname migrations.
Failure class routing
Failure classFirst ownerTypical action
DNSDNS, registrar, or platform ownerCheck records, delegation, provider status, and recent zone changes.
TCPNetwork, hosting, load balancer, or CDN ownerCheck port, firewall, listener, proxying, and public reachability.
TLS handshakeIngress, load balancer, reverse proxy, or server ownerCheck SNI, protocol, cipher, listener, and TLS termination config.
Hostname mismatchCertificate or platform ownerCheck SAN list, SNI hostname, and certificate binding.
Expiry or active-windowRenewal and deployment ownerRenew, deploy, reload, and verify the served certificate changed.
Trust chainServer, CDN, or certificate ownerInstall intermediates, fix chain order, or replace untrusted origin certificates.
02

Useful alerts start with useful labels

A single red status creates more triage. Domain Trust Watch separates DNS, TCP, TLS handshake, hostname mismatch, expiry, active-window, and trust-chain states so operators can route the event to the right owner.

03

Route urgent failures first

Use Slack incoming webhooks for watched operations channels and signed webhooks when certificate events should create tickets, update inventories, or trigger internal automation.

  • Send final-window expiry warnings where someone can act quickly.
  • Send validation failures by service or environment when possible.
  • Review delivery attempts when channels, receivers, or credentials change.
04

Automate follow-up where it helps

Use signed webhooks when certificate events should create tickets, update inventories, or enter incident routing. Keep Slack for watched human action and webhooks for systems that need to react.

  • Create a ticket when a 7-day expiry event reaches production.
  • Update inventory after issuer, SAN, fingerprint, or validity changes.
  • Escalate validation failures for critical app, API, identity, or CDN hostnames.
05

Keep the event reviewable

A good operational setup gives SREs a failure class, certificate fields, warning destination, and enough history to know whether a renewal or infrastructure change caused the event.

FAQ1 answer

  1. What makes certificate monitoring useful for DevOps and SRE?

    Useful monitoring separates network and certificate failures, stores public certificate snapshots, supports Slack and signed webhooks, and shows delivery attempts during review.

Related3 pagesAlert routingSend urgent warnings to watched channels and internal systems.Explore Alert routing
ToolFree SSL checkerInspect one public hostname before adding a monitor.GuideCertificate monitoring guideUnderstand what scheduled checks add beyond one-time diagnosis.
Diagnose one hostname

See whether the failure is DNS, TCP, TLS, or certificate validation.

Run the checker for a fast read, then use troubleshooting docs when you need exact failure-class behavior.

Run SSL checkerRead troubleshooting