Optimizing Check Budgets

Your check budget is shared across all checks, regions, and steps. This guide shows you how to maximize monitoring coverage while staying within budget.

How Budgets Work

Each check execution counts against your hourly budget:

Single check, single region: 1 check per execution
Single check, 5 regions: 5 checks per execution
5-step multistep, 3 regions: 15 checks per execution

Example: A check with 5 regions running every 10 minutes uses 30 checks/hour (5 regions × 6 executions/hr).

Strategy 1: Use Dependencies to Skip Unnecessary Checks

When a check has dependencies, it only runs if all dependencies are healthy. This saves budget when services are down.

Example: Health Check → Multistep Flow

Instead of running a complex multistep check every minute, set up a dependency chain:

# Step 1: Simple health check (runs every minute)
resource "quismon_check" "api_health" {
  name     = "API Health"
  type     = "https"
  config   = jsonencode({
    url = "https://api.example.com/health"
  })
  regions  = ["na-east-ewr"]
  interval_seconds = 60
}

# Step 2: Complex flow (only runs when health passes)
resource "quismon_check" "checkout_flow" {
  name     = "Checkout Flow"
  type     = "multistep"
  config   = jsonencode({
    steps = [
      { name = "login", type = "https", config = { url = "..." } },
      { name = "add-to-cart", type = "https", config = { url = "..." } },
      { name = "checkout", type = "https", config = { url = "..." } },
      { name = "payment", type = "https", config = { url = "..." } },
      { name = "confirm", type = "https", config = { url = "..." } }
    ]
  })
  regions  = ["na-east-ewr", "eu-central-fra"]
  interval_seconds = 300  # Every 5 minutes
  depends_on = [quismon_check.api_health.id]
}

Budget Savings:

Without dependency: 5 steps × 2 regions × 12/hr = 120 checks/hr
With dependency (90% uptime): ~108 checks/hr
When API is down: 0 checks wasted on the flow

Strategy 2: Optimize Region Selection

More regions = more budget. Choose regions strategically:

For Global Services

Use 3-5 key regions covering major user bases
NA (Newark), EU (Frankfurt), APAC (Singapore) covers most traffic

For Regional Services

Use 1-2 regions near your infrastructure
Add a distant region for latency comparison

Example Budget Impact

# 1 region: 1 check/execution
regions = ["na-east-ewr"]

# 5 regions: 5 checks/execution
regions = ["na-east-ewr", "na-west-lax", "eu-central-fra", "ap-southeast-sin", "sa-east-gru"]

# 31 regions: 31 checks/execution (use sparingly!)
regions = ["all"]  # Not recommended for frequent checks

Strategy 3: Tune Check Intervals

Interval is the most impactful budget lever:

Interval	Executions/Hour	Best For
10 seconds	360	Critical health checks (Enterprise)
30 seconds	120	Key APIs (Paid)
60 seconds	60	Standard monitoring
5 minutes	12	Complex flows, less critical
15 minutes	4	SSL expiry, DNS checks
1 hour	1	Daily health confirmation

Strategy 4: Use Inverted Checks for Security

Inverted checks alert when something shouldn't be accessible. These are typically low-frequency:

resource "quismon_check" "admin_not_public" {
  name     = "Admin Panel Not Public"
  type     = "https"
  config   = jsonencode({
    url             = "https://example.com/admin"
    expected_status = [401, 403, 404]  # Should NOT return 200
  })
  inverted = true  # Alert if it DOES return 200
  regions  = ["na-east-ewr"]
  interval_seconds = 300  # Check every 5 minutes is enough
}

Quick Reference: Budget Math

Checks per hour = Regions × Steps × (3600 / Interval)

Examples:
- 1 region, 1 step, 60s interval = 1 × 1 × 60 = 60 checks/hr
- 3 regions, 5 steps, 300s interval = 3 × 5 × 12 = 180 checks/hr
- 5 regions, 1 step, 30s interval = 5 × 1 × 120 = 600 checks/hr