Checkmate vs Gatus
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted monitoring & status options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Checkmate
Open-source uptime and infrastructure monitoring tool
VS
Gatus
Developer-oriented health dashboard and status page
| Feature | Checkmate | Gatus |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 93 · Excellent | 94 · Excellent |
| Category | Monitoring & Status | Monitoring & Status |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | TypeScript | Go |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | docker | docker, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 10,883 | ★ 12,145 |
| First released | 2024 | 2019 |
| Replaces | Pingdom, Better Uptime | UptimeRobot, Pingdom |
What are Checkmate and Gatus?
Checkmate
Checkmate is an open-source server monitoring application that tracks uptime, response times, and infrastructure health. It offers incident notifications and a clean dashboard for homelabs and small teams.
- Uptime and response monitoring
- Infrastructure health agent
- Incident notifications
- Modern dashboard
Gatus
Gatus is a developer-oriented health dashboard that monitors endpoints and exposes a status page driven by simple YAML config. It targets engineers wanting a config-as-code uptime monitor. It is deployed via Docker or a single binary.
- Configuration entirely as YAML
- Health checks and conditions
- Many alerting providers
- Tiny resource footprint
Checkmate vs Gatus: key differences
Checkmate is written in TypeScript, while Gatus is built with Go. Licensing differs — AGPL-3.0 for Checkmate versus Apache-2.0 for Gatus. Gatus is the lighter option, starting around 64 MB of RAM against 256 MB for Checkmate. Gatus is the more established project (first released 2019), while Checkmate arrived in 2024.
Why pick each one
Choose Checkmate if…
- Clean modern interface
- Active development
Watch out for
- Newer project
- Feature set still growing
Choose Gatus if…
- Config as code
- Extremely lightweight
- Easy to version control
Watch out for
- No UI-based editing
- Basic visualizations
Frequently asked questions
Is Checkmate or Gatus better?
Neither is universally better. Gatus has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Checkmate and Gatus free and open-source?
Yes. Checkmate is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and Gatus under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Checkmate and Gatus with Docker?
Checkmate: yes. Gatus: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Checkmate or Gatus?
Gatus has the smaller minimum footprint at 64 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for Checkmate. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.