Bionic Uptime and Uptime Kuma: what is actually different
Uptime Kuma is excellent free, open-source software, and if you enjoy running it, it may be all you need. This page says plainly what changes when someone else runs the monitor for you, and when you should keep Kuma.
| Feature | Uptime Kuma | Bionic Uptime |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free and open source; you pay for the server it runs on | 3 websites free, forever, no card; 20 websites for $12 a month |
| How often | As often as every 20 seconds | Every 60 seconds |
| Where it checks from | Wherever you run it: one server, one network | Two locations on two different companies' networks, alternating |
| Before an outage alert | Whatever retries you set, from that one server | Both locations plus a retry must agree within 45 seconds, on every plan including free |
| If the monitor itself goes down | You find out when you notice it is quiet | Not your job: we run it, and a gap in our checks is shown as a gap, never as a green tick |
| Alert channels | 90+ notification services | Email, plus one Slack, Discord, Microsoft Teams or Google Chat channel |
Uptime Kuma facts from its README on GitHub, read on 1 October 2026.
Keep Uptime Kuma if
- you like running it, and it lives somewhere other than the sites it watches,
- you want unlimited monitors for free, or checks every 20 seconds,
- you need one of its many notification services, or want to own the data.
Choose Bionic Uptime if
- you look after client websites and would rather not also look after the thing that watches them,
- your Kuma box shares a host or provider with your clients' sites, so a bad day there silences both,
- you want an outage confirmed from two networks before anybody is emailed (see the exact email).
See it before you sign up
Watch a real website being monitored right now, no sign-up. 3 websites are free, forever, with no card.