Notification channels

A channel is one delivery endpoint. One Slack channel, one email address, one webhook URL. You create channels once per project and bundle them into groups, which is what monitors point at.

All eight types are available on every plan, including Free.

Everything below happens under Settings → Notification Channels → Add Channel.

Connect Slack#

1. Click Connect Slack.
2. Authorize the Drumbeats app in your workspace.
3. Pick the destination channel.
4. Save, then click Test.

Drumbeats uses Slack's OAuth flow and never stores a raw webhook URL. One Slack channel per Drumbeats channel. To post to a second Slack channel, add a second Drumbeats channel.

An alert leads with the monitor name and a badge for the incident event, then the timestamp and a link that opens the incident.

When it breaks: the most common cause is the workspace reinstalling the app, which invalidates the token. The alert delivery fails and Drumbeats records it. Reconnect the channel from the Channels list.

Connect Microsoft Teams#

1. In Teams, open the target channel and add the Workflows app.
2. Choose the template Post to a channel when a webhook request is received and complete it. Teams gives you a webhook URL.
3. In Drumbeats, pick Microsoft Teams and paste the URL. Add a label so you can tell channels apart later.
4. Save, then click Test.

Alerts post as an Adaptive Card.

When it breaks: a retired or deleted Workflow returns an error and the alert is dropped. Teams gives no warning that the URL went stale, so re-test after any Teams admin change.

Connect PagerDuty#

1. In PagerDuty, open or create a Service and add an Events API v2 integration. Copy the 32-character integration key.
2. In Drumbeats, pick PagerDuty and paste the key.
3. Set Region to EU if your PagerDuty account is EU-hosted. Otherwise leave it on US.
4. Save, then click Test. The test fires a low-severity alert and resolves it immediately, so nobody gets woken up.

A monitor going DOWN triggers a PagerDuty incident. Recovery resolves it automatically. Severity follows the cause: missed and failed checks page as critical, duration anomalies as warning. Certificate expiry advisories are sent separately at low severity so they never collide with a real outage.

When it breaks: a wrong region is the usual cause, and it looks exactly like a dead integration key. Check the region before regenerating the key.

Connect Telegram#

1. Click Connect Telegram.
2. Open the Drumbeats bot from the link shown.
3. Send /start.
4. Follow the link back into the dashboard.
5. Confirm which project to connect.

Works for direct chats, groups, channels, and forum topics. The bot has to be a member of the destination conversation, and group admins may need to add it explicitly.

When it breaks: removing the bot from a group silently stops delivery. Telegram does not notify Drumbeats that this happened.

Connect Discord#

1. Click Connect Discord.
2. Authorize Drumbeats in your server.
3. Pick the target channel.
4. Save, then click Test.

Server admins do not need to paste webhook URLs by hand.

When it breaks: deleting the channel or revoking the app's access stops delivery. Re-authorize from the Channels list.

Add an email recipient#

One address per channel. Project members are approved automatically. External addresses get a confirmation mail and receive nothing until they click it, and unverified addresses expire after a grace window.

Email is the right fallback when you want broad visibility without depending on a chat app being open.

When it breaks: an unconfirmed external address is the usual cause, and it fails silently by design. Check the recipient's status on the channel before assuming the alert path is broken.

Enable browser push#

1. Open Settings → Notification Channels on the device you want alerts on.
2. Click Enable on This Device on the Push Notifications card.
3. Allow notifications when the browser asks.
4. Drumbeats sends a test push to confirm.

When it breaks: push troubleshooting walks every cause in order, from browser permission through OS settings to a dead service worker.

Send a webhook#

Webhooks bridge Drumbeats into Opsgenie, Datadog, or your own system. Simple mode POSTs a fixed JSON body. Advanced mode lets you set the URL, headers, and a templated body.

Webhooks is the full reference: the exact payload for DOWN and RECOVERY, the template placeholders, timeouts, and what happens when your endpoint is down.

When it breaks: a failed webhook is only retried when every other channel in the same group also failed. Read the warning on the webhooks page before you rely on one.

Roll a new channel out safely#

1. Create the channel and send a test.
2. Add it to a group alongside the channels you already trust.
3. Attach that group to one low-stakes monitor.
4. Trigger a real failure with curl .../failure and confirm delivery.
5. Roll out to the monitors that matter.

Next#

Groups for bundling these into routes. Alert logic for what triggers a channel to fire. Webhooks for the payload contract.