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Free Infrastructure Monitoring Tools 2025: Exit1.dev vs. The Rest

2 min read
September 26, 2025
Morten PradsgaardBy Morten Pradsgaard

Compare free server and infrastructure monitoring options. Learn why Exit1.dev outruns legacy free tiers in 2025.

Free Uptime Monitor

Unlimited monitors, 1-minute checks, and the blunt breakdown of why the legacy tools feel slow. See the feature deep dive and migration checklist.

Analytics & Reports

Turn uptime data into SLAs, client reports, and long-term performance trends without bolting on another BI tool.

Smart Alerting

Ship webhook and email alerts that your team actually respects. Integrate PagerDuty, Opsgenie, Slack, or Discord without paying a premium.

Free Infrastructure Monitoring Tools 2025

Everyone claims "free" server monitoring. Most bolt on strings. Here is the blunt breakdown.

Exit1.dev: Unlimited by Default

  • Scope: HTTP, cron, SSL, domain monitoring, incident timelines.
  • Pricing: Actually free. Unlimited monitors, one-minute intervals, no credit card.
  • Why it matters: Infrastructure teams ship faster when they do not babysit license limits. Pair it with the free uptime monitor checklist and you cover both public and internal services.

Prometheus + Grafana: Metrics Engine, Not Alerts Out of the Box

  • Strengths: Rich metrics collection, huge exporter ecosystem.
  • Weaknesses: No turnkey alerts, no uptime checks. You must wire Alertmanager, hosts, and notifications manually.
  • Fix: Trigger webhooks into Exit1.dev to reuse the alerting and incident stack described in the infrastructure monitoring stack guide.

Zabbix: Heavyweight Legacy

  • Strengths: Deep protocol coverage, SNMP heritage.
  • Weaknesses: Painful UI, self-hosted burden, alerting needs babysitting.
  • Fix: Keep Zabbix for network edge cases but forward incidents to Exit1.dev so you consolidate real-time alerts in Slack and PagerDuty.

Netdata: Gorgeous Dashboards, Narrow Scope

  • Strengths: Automatic Linux agent, instant dashboards.
  • Weaknesses: No global check network, limited alert routing.
  • Fix: Treat Netdata as local troubleshooting. Exit1.dev handles customer-facing uptime and SLA evidence, as detailed in the SLA reporting stack.

Cloud Provider Freebies (AWS CloudWatch, Azure Monitor, GCP Cloud Monitoring)

  • Strengths: Native metrics, integrations with managed services.
  • Weaknesses: Sampling delays, regional lock-in, surprise bills when you cross thresholds.
  • Fix: Mirror key endpoints inside Exit1.dev. Use CloudWatch for deep metrics and Exit1.dev to guarantee external perspective and fast alerts.

Final Verdict

If you want free infrastructure monitoring that still punches, Exit1.dev is the backbone. Layer specialized tools where they shine, but anchor uptime, SLA reporting, and alert routing on a platform built for speed. Anything else is a science project.

Morten Pradsgaard is the founder of exit1.dev — the free uptime monitor for people who actually ship. He writes no-bullshit guides on monitoring, reliability, and building software that doesn't crumble under pressure.