UptimeWire and UptimeRobot both watch a website from the outside and tell you when it stops working. They are built differently. UptimeRobot is a broad monitoring tool with many monitor types. UptimeWire is narrower: it watches a website with four fixed checks.
This page compares the two on what they check, how they alert, and what they cost. It is written by UptimeWire, so read it with that in mind. Where UptimeRobot does something better, we say so.
Note
UptimeRobot facts on this page were checked on its official pages on 2026-11-02. Plans and prices change. Confirm anything that matters on the vendor pages listed under Sources.
Quick comparison
| Feature | UptimeWire | UptimeRobot |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | 1 website, 5-minute checks | 50 monitors, 5-minute checks |
| Smallest paid plan | Starter: 10 websites, 3-minute checks | Solo: 10 monitors, 1-minute checks |
| Shortest interval | 1 minute (Business, Agency) | 1 minute on Solo; shorter on higher plans, but its own pages disagree on exact values |
| Uptime (HTTP) check | Every plan | Every plan |
| SSL certificate check | Every plan, including Free | Paid plans only |
| Domain expiration check | Every plan, including Free | Paid plans only |
| DNS | Resolution check on every plan | Separate DNS monitor, paid plans; can watch records for changes |
| Other monitor types | None | Keyword, ping, port, heartbeat, API, UDP |
| Alert channels | Email, Telegram on every plan; webhook, Discord, Slack, Teams on paid plans | Email, SMS, voice, push; many integrations, some paid only |
| Status pages | None on Free; 2, 5, or 25 on paid plans | 1 on Free; 3, 100, or unlimited on paid plans |
| History | 30 to 730 days by plan | 3 to 24 months by plan |
| API | Read-only, Business and Agency | Every plan |
What each service checks
UptimeWire adds one website at a time. A website is one exact address, such as https://example.com/. A different subdomain or path counts as another website. Each website gets four checks:
- Uptime: an HTTP request to the address on a schedule.
- SSL certificate: whether the certificate is valid and when it expires, for
httpsaddresses. - Domain expiration: when the domain registration ends, where the registry publishes it.
- DNS resolution: whether the name resolves to a public address.
You do not choose which checks to run, and you cannot add checks of other kinds. UptimeWire does not run browser journeys, measure servers, or find the cause of a failure. See what the checks do and how monitoring works.
UptimeRobot is organized around monitor types: HTTP(S), keyword, ping, port, heartbeat (cron job), DNS, API, and UDP. On the pricing page, the free plan covers HTTP, keyword, ping, and port monitors. Heartbeat, API, UDP, DNS, SSL, and domain monitoring start on the paid plans.
SSL and domain expiration are not separate monitor types at UptimeRobot. They are options on HTTP(S) and keyword monitors. SSL certificates are checked once every 24 hours. We did not find in its documentation whether these options use up your monitor allowance, so we do not claim either way.
DNS is the clearest difference
UptimeWire's DNS check answers one question: does the name still resolve to a public address? It alerts when that stops being true. It does not compare records over time, and it does not look at mail or text records.
UptimeRobot's DNS monitor tracks several record types and can alert when records change or disappear. If you need to know that a DNS record was altered, that is a real advantage, and UptimeWire does not offer it.
Check intervals and incident detection
Three different times are easy to confuse:
- The interval: how often a check runs.
- Confirmation: how many failures it takes before an incident opens.
- Notification: when the message reaches you.
A one-minute interval does not mean a one-minute alert.
| Detail | UptimeWire | UptimeRobot |
|---|---|---|
| Free interval | 5 minutes | 5 minutes |
| Paid intervals | 3 minutes (Starter), 1 minute (Business, Agency) | 1 minute on Solo; shorter on higher plans |
| Confirmation | Three failed checks in a row, 20 seconds apart, before an incident opens | Up to three repeat checks, about 10 to 20 seconds apart, from another data center in the same region |
| Several locations | Paid plans: 2 on Starter, 3 on Business, 5 on Agency; you cannot pick them | Paid plans can check from up to four regions |
Notification timing depends on the channel, on retries, and on the service you use to receive it. We do not promise a delivery time, and we did not find a delivery-time promise in UptimeRobot's documentation. The interval and the confirmation both add to the time before you hear about a failure.
On higher plans, UptimeRobot lists intervals of 30 or 15 seconds on its pricing page, while one of its help articles lists different values. We do not quote those here.
SSL, domain, and DNS warnings
For certificates and domains, what matters is how early you are warned.
- UptimeWire lets you choose the warning period for a certificate per website: 1, 2, 3, 7, 14, 30, or 60 days, with 30 as the default. Domain expiration has its own warning period. A warning is sent once, when the remaining time falls below the period you chose, and again if the problem clears and returns.
- UptimeRobot sends reminders at 30, 14, 7, and 0 days by default, and the days can be changed.
On the UptimeWire side, certificates are checked about every 6 hours, domains about once a day, and DNS about once an hour. These checks run on their own schedule, separate from your uptime interval.
See how to prevent SSL certificate expiration for what a warning is worth and what it cannot do. Neither service renews a certificate for you.
Alerts and notification channels
| Channel | UptimeWire | UptimeRobot |
|---|---|---|
| Every plan | Every plan | |
| Telegram | Every plan | Solo and above |
| Webhook | Starter and above | Team and above |
| Discord | Starter and above | Every plan (free plan lists 5 integrations) |
| Slack, Microsoft Teams | Business and above | Solo and above |
| SMS, voice | Not available yet | Paid in credits, on every plan |
| Push notifications | Not available yet | Mobile app |
| Zapier, PagerDuty | Not available | Team and above |
Which events each channel carries matters at UptimeWire. Email and Telegram carry outage, recovery, certificate, domain, and DNS alerts. Webhook, Discord, Slack, and Teams carry outage and recovery only. If you route alerts only to a chat channel, you will not be told about an expiring certificate.
UptimeRobot has the longer list of integrations and the more mature SMS and voice options. SMS and voice are paid separately in credits, and a voice call costs more than a text message.
Status pages and reporting
A status page is a public page that shows whether your service is up.
- UptimeWire: none on Free; 2 on Starter, 5 on Business, 25 on Agency. A custom domain and logo start on Business. It does not send updates to subscribers and does not support incident posts.
- UptimeRobot: 1 basic page on Free; up to 3 on Solo, with a custom domain; up to 100 on Team; unlimited on Scale. Its higher plans add white-label branding, passwords, and email subscribers.
For reports, UptimeWire's advanced report starts on Starter, and CSV export, an SLA report, and read-only API access start on Business. It does not send scheduled PDF reports. UptimeRobot sends monthly uptime reports (on the free plan only for the first three months), and its paid plans add SLA reports. The UptimeRobot API is on every plan; UptimeWire's is read-only and starts on Business.
History is kept for 30, 90, 365, or 730 days at UptimeWire, depending on the plan. UptimeRobot keeps 3 months on Free, 12 on Solo, and 24 on higher plans.
Pricing
Important
The two price lists use different units, different currencies, and different billing. Do not compare them as if they were the same size.
UptimeWire, in US dollars:
| Plan | Monthly | Annual | Websites | Shortest interval |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | $0 | 1 | 5 minutes |
| Starter | $19 | $190 | 10 | 3 minutes |
| Business | $49 | $490 | 25 | 1 minute |
| Agency | $99 | $990 | 100 | 1 minute |
The annual price is ten times the monthly price, which is two months free compared with paying monthly. Every website on every plan gets all four checks.
UptimeRobot, in euros as shown on its page:
- Free: 50 monitors, 5-minute interval.
- Solo: from €10 a month for 10 monitors, or €9 a month when billed yearly. Larger monitor counts cost more.
- Team, Scale, and Enterprise: higher plans with shorter intervals, more status pages, and more seats. We do not quote their prices, because the amounts on UptimeRobot's own pages differed when we read them.
UptimeRobot prices on its page are per month even when billed yearly, and its pricing page states a yearly saving of "about 15%". Its pricing page also notes a 14-day money-back guarantee.
What this means in practice: a plan with 10 UptimeRobot monitors and a plan with 10 UptimeWire websites are not the same size. At UptimeWire, one website is one address with four checks. At UptimeRobot, a monitor is one check target, and SSL and domain checks are options on it. For one or two websites, UptimeRobot's free plan is far larger than UptimeWire's. For a small group of websites where you want certificate, domain, and DNS checks on every one, compare the paid plans line by line rather than by headline price. See the UptimeWire pricing page.
Which service fits which use
- A solo site owner with one site: both have a free plan. UptimeRobot's has more room and more monitor types. UptimeWire's checks the certificate, the domain, and DNS on that one site without any setup of check types.
- Someone with many small projects: UptimeRobot's free plan allows 50 monitors. UptimeWire's free plan allows one website, so you would need a paid plan.
- A small business with a handful of sites: if expiry of certificates and domains is a real worry, check which plan gives you those checks. At UptimeRobot they need a paid plan; at UptimeWire they come with every website.
- Developers: UptimeRobot covers APIs, ports, heartbeats, and cron jobs. UptimeWire covers websites only.
- Agencies: UptimeWire's Agency plan has 100 websites, 25 status pages, and 5 team members. UptimeRobot's higher plans have more seats and unlimited status pages. Compare the status page features you need.
- Teams that need chat and paging integrations: UptimeRobot's list is longer. UptimeWire sends outage and recovery messages to webhook, Discord, Slack, and Teams, but not certificate or domain warnings.
Final assessment
Neither service is better for everyone.
Choose UptimeRobot if you need monitor types beyond websites, a large free allowance, DNS record-change alerts, or a long list of integrations.
Choose UptimeWire if what you want is a simple setup for websites, with uptime, certificate, domain, and DNS checks on each one and no choices to make about check types, and you accept a narrower product.
Both are worth a trial on a real website before you decide.
Frequently asked questions
Is UptimeWire a replacement for every UptimeRobot monitor type?
No. UptimeWire monitors websites only. It does not offer keyword, ping, port, heartbeat, API, or UDP monitors.
Does a one-minute interval mean I am alerted within a minute?
No. The interval is how often a check runs. A failure must be confirmed before an incident opens, and the alert then travels through your chosen channel. At UptimeWire, an incident opens after three failed checks in a row, 20 seconds apart.
Why does UptimeWire count websites and UptimeRobot count monitors?
UptimeWire treats one website, meaning one exact address, as one unit with four checks. UptimeRobot treats each check target as a monitor and lets you choose its type.
Does the free plan of either service cover SSL and domain expiration?
At UptimeWire, yes: every website on every plan gets SSL certificate and domain expiration checks. At UptimeRobot, SSL and domain monitoring are listed on paid plans, as of 2026-11-02.
Can I use both?
Yes. Nothing stops you from monitoring the same website with both and comparing what each one reports.