Healthchecks 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.
Healthchecks
Cron job and scheduled task monitoring
VS
PHP Server Monitor
Simple PHP tool for monitoring servers and websites
| Feature | Healthchecks | PHP Server Monitor |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 93 · Excellent | 19 · At risk |
| Category | Monitoring & Status | Monitoring & Status |
| License | BSD-3-Clause | GPL-3.0 |
| Language | Python | PHP |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal | docker, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 10,358 | ★ 2,188 |
| First released | 2015 | 2010 |
| Replaces | Pingdom | Pingdom, UptimeRobot |
What are Healthchecks and PHP Server Monitor?
Healthchecks
Healthchecks is a self-hosted service that monitors cron jobs and scheduled tasks using dead man's switch pings. It targets administrators who need to know when a recurring job silently fails. It is deployed via Docker or a Django install.
- Dead man's switch for cron jobs
- Many notification integrations
- Per-check schedules and grace
- REST API
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
Healthchecks vs PHP Server Monitor: key differences
Healthchecks is written in Python, while PHP Server Monitor is built with PHP. Licensing differs — BSD-3-Clause for Healthchecks 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 Healthchecks. PHP Server Monitor is the more established project (first released 2010), while Healthchecks arrived in 2015. Healthchecks has the considerably larger community, at 10,358 GitHub stars versus 2,188.
Why pick each one
Choose Healthchecks if…
- Catches silently failing jobs
- Lots of notification channels
- Lightweight
Watch out for
- Narrow use case
- Not for metrics
Choose PHP Server Monitor if…
- Very easy to deploy
- Low resource use
Watch out for
- Basic feature set
- Limited graphing
Frequently asked questions
Is Healthchecks or PHP Server Monitor better?
Neither is universally better. Healthchecks has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Healthchecks and PHP Server Monitor free and open-source?
Yes. Healthchecks is licensed under BSD-3-Clause and PHP Server Monitor under GPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Healthchecks and PHP Server Monitor with Docker?
Healthchecks: yes. PHP Server Monitor: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Healthchecks or PHP Server Monitor?
PHP Server Monitor has the smaller minimum footprint at 128 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for Healthchecks. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.