What does a SaaS startup need from a status page before its first outage? A hosted page customers can find and subscribe to, and a quick way for your team to post updates, ideally tied to the monitoring you already run. Most tools here cover that much; they differ in whether monitoring, on-call or incident response comes bundled in.
Status pages tend to get set up in a hurry, usually the morning after a customer emails to ask whether you're down. That's the worst time to choose one. The eight tools below are listed in no particular order and grouped by the job each one leans towards, so a founder or an engineer can get to a shortlist of two in an evening rather than in the middle of an incident.
Settle these before you sign up for anything
Run down this list with whoever's going to be answering the alerts. Most of it takes a few minutes, and every answer cuts the field.
- Who reads the page: every customer, a handful of larger accounts, or only your own team.
- Whether you need a public page, a private one, or both side by side.
- Where updates get written from: a web dashboard, Slack, Teams or an incident tool.
- Whether uptime monitoring should come with the page, or whether you already monitor somewhere else.
- How customers hear about an incident: email, Slack, RSS or simply visiting the page.
- Who's on call out of hours, and whether that lives in the same product.
- Whether open-source code your engineers can read matters to the team.
- What each vendor names on its own site about a free plan or a trial.
If you already have monitoring you trust, the list gets much shorter, because you're mostly choosing a page and a way to post to it. If you've got nothing yet, a tool that bundles monitoring with the page saves you wiring two products together on day one.
Who these vendors say they're writing for
Only a few vendors here name SaaS buyers on their own pages. Hyperping lists a SaaS and startups use case, Checkly a SaaS and B2B software one, and Uptime.com puts a SaaS solution in its menu. Others, such as Atlassian Statuspage or openstatus, speak to teams generally, and that's fine: a status page for a small software company isn't a strange request for any of them.
What matters more is what comes attached. Several of these bundle the status page with monitoring, on-call or incident response, so the thing you're trialling may be a much bigger product than the page you came for. Before anything else, test the part your customers will see. Post a dummy incident, subscribe with a personal email address, and check what lands in your inbox and how the page reads on a phone. If that part feels clumsy, the extras won't rescue it.
How the eight split by job
Think of them in three loose groups. The first is page-first tools, where the status page is the product and everything else supports it. The hosted option from the big software company sits here, with public, private and audience-specific page types, and so does Instatus, which adds uptime monitoring and lets the team handle incidents from Slack or Teams.
The second group leads with monitoring. The monitoring-as-code platform and the two tools with SaaS entries in their menus come at status pages from the checks side, which suits engineers who'd rather define what's watched than click through settings. The open-source option fits loosely here too, with uptime monitoring and incident response run from Slack.
The third group leads with incidents. incident.io keeps its status pages in sync with incident management and sends subscriber updates by email, Slack and RSS, while Better Stack offers its status page as one product inside a wider platform. These make most sense once you have a defined way of handling outages, or plan to build one soon.
The eight side by side
| Tool | What kind of tool | Who it suits |
|---|---|---|
| Atlassian Statuspage | Hosted status pages | Teams needing public, private or audience-specific pages |
| Better Stack | Status pages in a wider platform | Teams wanting status pages beside other tools from one vendor |
| Checkly | Monitoring as code with status pages | Engineers who write their checks as code |
| Hyperping | Status pages, monitoring and on-call | Small SaaS teams wanting a page builder plus monitoring |
| incident.io | Status pages with incident management | Teams already running a formal incident process |
| Instatus | Status pages and monitoring | Small teams who work inside Slack or Teams |
| openstatus | Open-source status page and monitoring | Teams who want code they can inspect |
| Uptime.com | Monitoring with a status page | SaaS teams who want monitoring first |
All eight, A to Z
Alphabetical, in no particular order of merit. Each line is drawn from how the vendor describes its own product.
Atlassian Statuspage
Best for: Running separate public, private and audience-specific status pages; vendor claim: an Uptime Showcase displays historical uptime.
Better Stack
Best for: A status page product that sits inside a larger platform; vendor claim: it helps you communicate downtime and build trust.
Checkly
Best for: Teams defining monitoring as code who want status pages from the same place; its own menu names a SaaS and B2B software use case.
Hyperping
Best for: Building a status page with a builder, with SaaS and startups named in its own use-case menu; vendor claim: protect your APIs and earn customer trust.
incident.io
Best for: Status pages kept in sync with incident management, with subscriber updates by email, Slack and RSS; vendor claim: automate updates or use pre-approved templates.
Instatus
Best for: Status pages plus uptime monitoring, with incident collaboration from Slack and Teams; vendor claim: a free forever plan.
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openstatus
Best for: An open-source status page with uptime monitoring and Slack-based incident response; vendor claim: run incident response from Slack or your AI agent.
Uptime.com
Best for: Monitoring with a status page attached and a SaaS entry in its solutions menu; vendor claim: all-in-one incident communication through the status page.
Run a pretend outage through two of them
A status page only proves itself on a bad day, so create one on purpose. Pick two tools from the group that matches how your team works, then put the same small fake incident through both.
- Set up a page for one real service, using your product name and your own domain if the tool allows it.
- Subscribe a personal email address and, if offered, a Slack channel or RSS reader.
- Open an incident from wherever your team would really write it: the dashboard, Slack or Teams.
- Post two updates and a resolution, then time how long each one takes to reach the subscriber.
- Read the page on your phone as a customer would, and ask a colleague who wasn't involved to do the same.
- Delete the test incident and note which tool you'd trust at three in the morning.
For a founder setting up the first page
If you're the person who'll be writing the updates, choose the tool that makes posting the fastest from the place you already spend your day, because speed during an incident matters more than any feature on the sales page. A small team rarely needs audience-specific pages or a full incident process on day one, so don't buy for a future you haven't reached.
Start with the page and simple subscriptions, add monitoring if you don't have it, and revisit incident tooling once outages involve more than two people. For more options beyond startups, my wider guide to status page software covers the category in full, and if you're formalising how problems get logged internally, these incident reporting tools sit on the other side of the same job.
Do you make status page or uptime software? Tool makers can ask to be considered for a featured place on this list.
Want your tool on this list? Featured spots and reviews here are paid partnerships. Here's how to partner with me.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need a status page before my first outage?
It helps to have one ready. Setting it up during an incident means writing settings and updates at the same time, and customers notice the delay. A basic hosted page with subscriptions takes far less effort when nothing's on fire.
Should my status page be public or private?
Most SaaS startups start public, so any customer can check and subscribe. Private or audience-specific pages make sense once you have larger accounts or internal services you'd rather not show to everyone.
Can I write status updates from Slack?
Several tools here say you can handle incidents or post updates from Slack, and one names Teams too. Check this in your trial by posting a real test update from your own workspace.
Do I need separate monitoring software as well?
Not always. A number of these bundle uptime monitoring with the page, so a young product can start with one tool. If you already monitor elsewhere, look for a page-first tool and connect the two.
Is an open-source status page a sensible choice for a startup?
It can be, particularly if your engineers want to read the code. Weigh that against who'll maintain it, and check what the project offers as a hosted option before you decide.
How should customers be told about an incident?
Offer at least email subscriptions, and add Slack or RSS if your customers are technical. Keep updates short and dated, say what's affected and when you'll post next.
