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Checkmate vs PHP Server Monitor

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted monitoring & status options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
Checkmate Open-source uptime and infrastructure monitoring tool VS PH PHP Server Monitor Simple PHP tool for monitoring servers and websites
FeatureCheckmatePHP Server Monitor
Deploy effortUnder-an-hour setupUnder-an-hour setup
Health score93 · Excellent19 · At risk
CategoryMonitoring & StatusMonitoring & Status
LicenseAGPL-3.0GPL-3.0
LanguageTypeScriptPHP
Setup difficultyEasyEasy
Min. RAM256 MB128 MB
Deploymentdockerdocker, bare-metal
GitHub stars★ 10,883★ 2,188
First released20242010
ReplacesPingdom, Better UptimePingdom, UptimeRobot

What are Checkmate and PHP Server Monitor?

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

Read the full Checkmate guide →

PHP Server Monitor

PHP Server Monitor is a lightweight script that checks whether websites and servers are up and sends notifications by email, SMS, or messaging services when they go down. It runs on common LAMP hosting.

  • Website and port checks
  • Email and SMS alerts
  • Uptime history
  • Runs on shared hosting

Read the full PHP Server Monitor guide →

Checkmate vs PHP Server Monitor: key differences

Checkmate is written in TypeScript, while PHP Server Monitor is built with PHP. Licensing differs — AGPL-3.0 for Checkmate versus GPL-3.0 for PHP Server Monitor. PHP Server Monitor is the lighter option, starting around 128 MB of RAM against 256 MB for Checkmate. PHP Server Monitor is the more established project (first released 2010), while Checkmate arrived in 2024. Checkmate has the considerably larger community, at 10,883 GitHub stars versus 2,188.

Why pick each one

Choose Checkmate if…

  • Clean modern interface
  • Active development

Watch out for

  • Newer project
  • Feature set still growing
Checkmate details

Choose PHP Server Monitor if…

  • Very easy to deploy
  • Low resource use

Watch out for

  • Basic feature set
  • Limited graphing
PHP Server Monitor details

Frequently asked questions

Is Checkmate or PHP Server Monitor better?

Neither is universally better. Checkmate has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.

Are Checkmate and PHP Server Monitor free and open-source?

Yes. Checkmate is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and PHP Server Monitor under GPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Checkmate and PHP Server Monitor with Docker?

Checkmate: yes. PHP Server Monitor: yes.

Which is lighter on resources, Checkmate or PHP Server Monitor?

PHP Server Monitor has the smaller minimum footprint at 128 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for Checkmate. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.

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