Know the moment a cron job goes quiet

Q: What if the ping endpoint is unreachable when my job runs?

Use retries, like the `--retry` flag in the curl example, so one dropped connection never counts as a missed run.

20 checks free forever. 100 checks for $9 a month. Healthchecks charges $20 for the same headroom.

No card. Paste one line at the end of the job.

The failure nobody sees

Uptime monitors watch pages that answer. A nightly backup does not answer. Neither does the 2 a.m. invoice export or the job that renews a certificate.

When those stop, the website still loads. Three weeks later someone needs the file, and the newest copy is from the 4th.

Ping Clock flips the check. The job reports in. Silence is the alert.

How it works

Create a check. Name it and give it a schedule: every 24 hours with 30 minutes of grace, or a cron expression in any IANA time zone.

Add one line to the job. Ping the check URL when the job succeeds. Optional: ping /start when it begins and /fail when it breaks.

Get told when it goes quiet. Past the grace time, the check goes down and alerts fire. When pings resume, you get a recovery message.

Paste and go

Example URLs only. Your dashboard shows the real one for each check.

Bash / crontab

0 2 * * * /usr/local/bin/backup.sh && curl -fsS -m 10 --retry 5 https://www.pingclock.com/ping/YOUR-CHECK-ID

Python

import urllib.request
# ... your job ...
urllib.request.urlopen("https://www.pingclock.com/ping/YOUR-CHECK-ID", timeout=10)

Node.js

// ... your job ...
await fetch("https://www.pingclock.com/ping/YOUR-CHECK-ID");

PowerShell

# ... your job ...
Invoke-RestMethod https://www.pingclock.com/ping/YOUR-CHECK-ID

Kubernetes CronJob

command: ["/bin/sh", "-c", "./run-job && wget -qO- https://www.pingclock.com/ping/YOUR-CHECK-ID"]

What you get

Period or cron schedules. Simple "every N hours" with grace, or full cron syntax with any IANA time zone.
Start, success and fail signals. See "did not run", "ran and failed", and "started but never finished".
Exit codes. Ping /0 or /1 and so on, straight from the job's exit status.
Run duration. With start and success pings, Pro and Business record how long each run took.
Log tail. On Pro and Business, POST the last lines of output with the ping and read them next to the failure.
Email-in pings. A unique address per check for tools that can only send mail.
Alerts. Email and Slack on Free. Microsoft Teams, Discord and generic webhooks on Starter and up.
API. Create and manage checks from code on Pro and Business.

Built for people who still own the crontab

If the backup, the import or the cert renewal is your job, Ping Clock is built for you. Twenty checks cover a homelab or a single VPS. Starter is $9 a month for 100 checks. Pro is $29 a month when you want duration, log tails and the API.

Pricing

Free is $0 a month for 20 checks, one user, email and Slack. Starter is $9 a month. Pro is $29 a month. Business is $79 a month. Yearly billing is $90, $290 and $790, which is two months free. Cancel any time. Your first paid charge comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

FAQ

Does a ping slow down my job?

It is one HTTP request at the end. Use a short timeout so a network hiccup never blocks the job.

What if the ping endpoint is unreachable when my job runs?

Use retries, like the --retry flag in the curl example, so one dropped connection never counts as a missed run.

Can I see why a job failed?

On Pro and Business, send the last lines of output in the POST body. They show up on the failed run.

What is the difference between period and cron schedules?

Period: expect a ping every 6 hours. Cron: expect a ping at 02:00 Europe/Berlin every weekday. Cron schedules follow the time zone you set, including daylight saving.

What alerts do I get?

Email and Slack on every plan. Teams, Discord and webhooks on Starter and up.

What is on Free?

20 checks, email and Slack, one user. No card. No trial clock.

How is this different from uptime monitoring?

Uptime watches things that respond. Heartbeats watch things that are supposed to run. Ping Clock is the heartbeat.

Who runs this

Ping Clock is built by StyleLine FZE, Sharjah Research, Technology and Innovation Park (SRTIP) Free Zone, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.

Email support@pingclock.com. We reply within one business day.