About Downdetector
Downdetector is a platform that displays the current status of internet services, websites, mobile apps, and providers. The information is crowdsourced from users who report issues as they come across them.
Downdetector is a popular service. Nowadays, organizations depend on a huge variety of services and so need to have the most reliable and detailed view of everything that’s going on.
DevOps teams, SRE teams, and system administrators rely on up-to-the-minute information to ensure the smooth running of their services, and they need a solution that is optimized for business.
Let’s take a quick look at what Downdetector does and doesn’t do. Then we’ll give you a rundown of some of the most popular alternatives to Downdetector, especially those aimed more at business customers.
Why consider Downdetector alternatives?
If you’re a business with multiple dependencies, getting instant detailed status information that’s easy to read and completely accurate is crucial to keep you ahead of the game.
Downdetector provides an overview of outages in real-time and is particularly popular with consumers. For businesses that need to know more details on the status of their dependencies, it has certain limitations. Let’s take a closer look.
Advantages
- Free option. Check basic status data by performing a search query from the homepage for free
- Range of services. Information is available regarding the status of many different websites and services
- Early alerts. Downdetector user reports can be a source of early information about an organization’s own outages (paid Enterprise plan required)
- Dashboard features (paid Enterprise plan only) include location-based reports and a comparative view, which allows you to overlay outage data from multiple service providers to look for correlations
- Twitter notifications on status changes. Upgrade to the Enterprise plan for email and RSS feed options.
Disadvantages
- Uses unofficial data. Downdetector runs on information reported by users. This may not be a high enough standard for businesses that rely on accurate information about multiple services in order to maintain their own organization’s reputation
- Poor visualizations. Each status page features a graph of outages over time which only offers limited information
- No granular detail. Service status pages contain no detail on individual components or regional services
- Unattractive UX. As well as a cluttered status display, ads on the website create additional noise
- Status display isn’t the priority. The first thing users see when they look for a service is a form to report its status; business users need instant information, without extra elements to click through
- Limited notifications for non-subscribers. Downdetector’s basic option is only integrated with Twitter for notifications. Users must otherwise check the website itself or subscribe to receive email alerts
- Focus seems to be on the free option. The premium Enterprise plan provides business users with a dashboard to access information, but it feels secondary to the website.
Status Monitoring Tools that are Downdetector Alternatives
1. StatusGator – the No.1 Downdetector competitor
StatusGator is a status page aggregation platform that allows users to view the status of all their vendors in one dashboard and share a unified status page with their team. You can choose to have a public or private status page. It was established in 2015 and is one of the most trusted of all monitoring providers.
Advantages
- Official data. Outage data is based on information from each service’s official status page and doesn’t depend on user reporting
- Customize your dashboard so all the services you need are in one place. Plus create dashboards for each team or department in your organization
- Granular detail. Filter by specific components of vendor services that the company depends on
- Historical data. Access extended history of outages per vendor, especially useful when considering changing vendors
- Team view of the dashboard is available
- Proactive status monitoring
- Improve internal communication by overriding status info and messages
- Over 2,700 services included
- New services are added all the time, including those requested by users
- Frequent updates and service improvements
- Customize your status page(s) to include your company’s logo and brand identity
- Free trial of the premium option
- Feature-packed free option
- Dark mode is available.
Disadvantages
- Some pricing options are higher than other tools’, although the range of features offered is more comprehensive
- Maintenance and outage histories are limited to the free account.
2. IsDown vs Downdetector
This service isn’t entirely dissimilar to StatusGator, particularly in the number of services monitored, but its features are limited, especially when compared to what is offered by StatusGator for an equivalent price. But let’s look at IsDown.app as a Downdetector competitor.
Advantages
- Dashboard displays the chosen service statuses
- Provides advance warning of future maintenance
- Real-time notifications for services and service components
- Users can request services to be monitored
- Free trial of the Pro plan.
Disadvantages
- No historical data on maintenance or downtime is available on the website
- Hard to find a list of all major services currently experiencing issues.
3. Down for Everyone or Just Me vs Downdetector
This tool works similarly to the popular isitdownrightnow.com platform, albeit with a more modern design and user-friendly UX – and fewer users. It provides service status information based on crowdsourced consumer reports.
Down for Everyone or Just Me features mostly consumer services, which means business users may not find all the services they use listed on the site.
Advantages
- Free. It’s a free platform
- Simple. The design is pleasingly minimalistic.
Disadvantages
- No summary of all the most popular services and their current statuses
- Slow. It takes a few seconds to fetch information about the website status
- No historical data on downtime is available
- No information on maintenance is available to help advance planning.
4. Is The Service Down?
This app focuses more on consumer service. It is similar to Downdetector.
Advantages
- Detailed reports. Issues with a service are broken down into categories
- History. Look back at up to 24 hours of historical outage data
- Map view shows the locations of users who have reported issues
- Twitter feed on the website shows recent posts from users and help desks
- Commenting. Provides an option for users to post comments and interact with other users
- Report issues yourself
- International. Choose from a (limited) list of countries
- Free service.
Disadvantages
- Limited range. The number of cloud services and SaaS platforms – which many businesses depend on – is limited
- Not great in the US. Only a small number of US services are monitored
- Consumer-focused. Generally limited selection of services for businesses
- Relies on users. Information comes from crowdsourced user reports
- Annoying ads take up the website and make it feel unprofessional.
5. Outage.Report vs Downdetector
The service looks similar to Downdetector and offers to view the latest reports received in the last 48 hours in 9 different countries.
Advantages
- Quick-access historical data. Get outage info for the last two days from the homepage
- Country-specific service lists for 9 countries
- Detailed history. Several months of outage history are available from each service’s status page
- Timeline of reports on issues within the past 24 hours
- Outage map on each service page
- Twitter feed with service-related posts
- Comments section
- Report your own issues
- Multilingual. Nine different language options
- Free service.
Disadvantages
- Cluttered service status pages make it hard to find information quickly
- Consumer-focused. The number of cloud services and SaaS platforms essential to many businesses is limited
- Not great in the US. Not many US-based services are monitored
- Users report outages. The information does not come directly from a service’s own status pages.
Downdetector Competitors
Here we compare Downdetector with other players on the market back-to-back.
| Category | Downdetector | StatusGator | ISDOWN | Down for Everyone or Just me | Is the SERVICEDOWN? | OUTAGE.REPORT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Type of monitored services | Telecom, business, games, finance | Cloud, SaaS, websites | Cloud, SaaS | Websites | Telecom, service providers | Telecom, other |
| Number of services | 2 million | 2,700+ | ❓N/A | 198 listed, more via search | 216 | 130+ in the US, 900 worldwide |
| Source of status data | User reports | Official vendors | ❓Official vendors | Server checks | User reports | User reports |
| Status page | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes | ❌ No | ❌ No | ❌ No |
| Requests to add service | ❌ No | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes | ❌ No | ✅ Yes | ❌ No |
| History | 24 hours | Years when signed in | Up to 30 days | ❌ No | 24 hours | 3 months |
| Notifications | Twitter - free email, RSS, and push on paid plan | Slack, email, SMS, MS Teams, and more | Slack, email, SMS, MS Teams, and more | ❌ No | ❌ No | ❌ No |
| Integrations | API | API, Atlassian, Statuspage, Datadog, and many other | Zapier, Webhook, and other | RESTful, JSON API (on request) | ❌ No | ❌ No |
| Free trial | ❓N/A | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes | ❓N/A | ❓N/A | ❓N/A |
| Price | Upon request | From $72 per month ✅ Free version available | From $35 per month | Free | Free | Free |
Would you like to monitor your dependencies together with a team? Sign up for StatusGator!
FAQ on Downdetector Alternatives
What is the best Downdetector alternative?
The best all-rounder in the status aggregation game has to be StatusGator.
On top of its transparent pricing structure, comprehensive feature profile, and exceptionally peaceful UX, knowing that the information provided is accurate – as it has been obtained by checking the site itself, not by aggregating user reports – provides great peace of mind for your enterprise.
Downdetector is secretive about its pricing. In order to use the alarms, notifications, dashboard, and API, you must become an Enterprise user. As far as we know, the fee varies from client to client. You’ll have to contact Downdetector to find out what you’ll be charged. Alternatively, you can look up StatusGator which is perfect for business and displays its prices in the open here.
Downdetector has a feature-rich API which allows you to incorporate all the crowdsourced data from the service into your own applications and tools. You can also benefit from integrating Downdetector alerts into your system.
To use the Downdetector API, you will have to be an Enterprise user, which means paying a subscription fee.
More on alternative to learn if the services you depend on are down
Recent Posts
