The Better Stack alternative without per-seat pricing
Uptime monitoring, on-call, incidents and status pages for your whole team at a flat price per monitor. Password-protected status pages are included, not add-ons.
Which one fits you
Better Stack: Better Stack is an observability platform that combines uptime monitoring, on-call and incident management, status pages, logs, metrics and tracing. It is priced per responder, with monitors and status page features sold in bundles and add-ons.
Choose Spectate when
- You want everyone on call without paying per responder: Team and Business have unlimited members.
- You need DNS, SMTP, IMAP and POP3 checks next to HTTP, ping and TCP.
- You want password protection, subscribers and custom domains on status pages without per-page add-ons.
- You want alerts from Grafana, Prometheus Alertmanager and Sentry routed through the same escalation paths.
Choose Better Stack when
- You want logs, metrics, tracing and uptime in one product. Spectate has no logs or APM.
- You need Playwright transaction checks, which Spectate doesn't have.
- You need SOC 2 Type 2 or SSO with Okta or Azure today.
- You only need a few monitors for a personal project: Better Stack's free plan covers 10.
- You want each monitor checked from several regions at once.
Spectate vs Better Stack, feature by feature
Better Stack pricing: Better Stack has a free plan with 10 monitors. Paid use is $34 per responder a month ($29 billed yearly), plus $25 a month per 50 extra monitors and status page add-ons such as $50 a month per password-protected page (checked October 2026).
| Feature | Spectate | Better Stack |
|---|---|---|
| Monitoring | ||
| HTTP(S) and keyword checks | Yes | Yes |
| Ping, TCP and DNS checks | Yes | Yes |
| SMTP, IMAP and POP3 checks | Yes | Yes |
| Shortest check interval | 30sTeam and Business; 60s on Starter | 30s |
| Check locations | 1 of 4 regions per monitorPick Europe, North America, Asia or Oceania per monitor; a failed check is rechecked from the same region after about 5s before the monitor goes down. | Multiple regions per monitor |
| Heartbeat (cron) monitorsBetter Stack includes 10 heartbeats, then $20 a month per 10. | Yes | Yes |
| Browser and transaction checksBetter Stack charges $1 per 100 Playwright minutes. | No | Paid add-on |
| Logs, tracing and APM | No | Yes |
| Alerting and on-call | ||
| On-call schedules and escalation | Team and Business | Yes |
| SMS and phone calls | Included credits10, 50 or 200 credits a month per plan; packs of 100 for €19 | Unlimited per responder |
| Alerts from Grafana, Prometheus and Sentry | Yes | Yes |
| Incidents | ||
| Incidents with timeline and postmortems | Yes | Yes |
| Status pages | ||
| Status pages included | 1, 5 or unlimitedStarter, Team, Business | 1, then $15 a month each |
| Password-protected status pageBetter Stack: $50 a month per page ($42 billed yearly). | Yes | Paid add-on |
| Subscribers | 250, 2,500 or 25,000 | 1,000, then $40 per 1,000 |
| Pricing | ||
| Price for 50 monitors and 5 responders | €48 a monthTeam: 50 monitors is under the 80-monitor minimum, so 80 × €0.60 = €48 a month (€480 a year). Unlimited members, so 5 or 50 responders cost the same. | $195 a month5 responders × $34 = $170, plus one 50-monitor bundle ($25) on top of the 10 included. Billed yearly: 5 × $29 + $21 = $166 a month. |
| Per-user pricing | No | Yes |
| Free planSpectate has a 14-day trial without a card instead. | No | Yes |
| Billing currency | EUR | USD |
| Data and compliance | ||
| Headquarters | Netherlands | United States and Czech Republic |
| Invoiced from the EU, in eurosBetter Stack, Inc. is a Delaware corporation. It does store data in EU regions by default. | Yes | No |
| SOC 2 | No | Yes |
Checked in Oct 2026 from Better Stack's public pages (betterstack.com/pricing, betterstack.com/security, betterstack.com/terms). Prices change: if something here is out of date, tell us at hello@spectate.net and we'll fix it.
Moving from Better Stack
Most teams run both side by side for a week. Email help@spectate.net if you'd like a hand.
- 01Start a 14-day trial; no card needed. The trial runs on Team, with 80 monitors and on-call.
- 02Recreate your Better Stack checks as Spectate monitors. There is no importer; each monitor takes a minute or two, and help@spectate.net can help with larger lists.
- 03Connect your channels (email, Slack, Microsoft Teams, Telegram, phone numbers) and set up an escalation path.
- 04Run both tools side by side for a few days, then move your status page domain with one DNS record.
Spectate and Better Stack
Is Spectate cheaper than Better Stack?
For teams with several responders, usually yes. 50 monitors and 5 responders cost €48 a month on Spectate Team, against about $195 a month on Better Stack (5 responders at $34 plus one 50-monitor bundle). For one person with 10 monitors, Better Stack's free plan is cheaper.
Can I import my monitors from Better Stack?
Not automatically; there is no importer. Recreating a monitor takes a minute or two, and help@spectate.net can help if you have a long list.
Does Spectate have logs and tracing like Better Stack?
No. Spectate covers uptime, server metrics from its agent, alerting, on-call, incidents and status pages. If you need log management or APM in the same product, Better Stack is the better fit.
Does Spectate charge per responder?
No. You pay per monitor or host. Team and Business have unlimited members, so everyone can be on call at the same price.
Does Spectate have heartbeat monitors?
Yes. A job calls a secret URL each time it runs, and you get an alert when a call is late or the job reports a failure with its exit code and output. Each heartbeat monitor counts as one monitor on your plan.
Other tools teams switch from
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