Purpose
Status pages are designed for customer-facing communication. They should show useful operational state without leaking internal debug data, secrets, request IDs, stack traces, or raw monitor internals.
Public and private pages
Public status pages can be opened with the normal status page URL and may offer email subscriptions when subscriptions are enabled.
Private status pages require a private link from the Watchfox app. Anyone with that private link can view the page, so share it only with the intended audience. Private status pages are clearly labeled on the rendered page, but the private token is not shown in the page body.
Components
Components map monitors to customer-readable service names. Use names that make sense to clients, such as Main website, Checkout, API, or Client portal.
Incidents
Status pages can show current and historical incidents. Incident copy should be clear, factual, and public-safe.
Maintenance
Use one-time maintenance windows to separate planned work from unexpected downtime. This helps customers understand why a service may be unavailable during a planned period.
Subscriptions
Where enabled, visitors can subscribe to public-safe incident, recovery, and maintenance updates on public status pages. New subscriptions are limited by plan to prevent unexpected email volume. Subscriber emails must never be exposed on public pages or public JSON.
Email subscriptions are available for public status pages only. Private status pages show an informational message instead of an active subscribe form.
Visitors can subscribe to all components or selected components only. Component-specific incident and recovery updates are sent only to subscribers who selected the affected component or subscribed to the whole page.
Every status update email includes a Watchfox unsubscribe link. Opening the link asks for confirmation before the subscription is disabled, which prevents email security scanners from unsubscribing visitors accidentally.
After unsubscribing, a visitor can subscribe again from the public status page. Re-subscribing starts a new double opt-in confirmation flow and updates resume only after the new confirmation link is opened.
Branding
Higher plans can unlock additional status page branding, custom domains, or white-label behavior depending on entitlement state.