Although not the flashiest part of the development process, the best devs know one thing for sure: deployment monitoring matters. The reason is simple: keeping an eye on your deployments helps you make sure that everything in your project keeps working as intended.
Deployment monitoring catches failure fast, identifying issues that could be introduced by new releases before users even notice. This way, it also increases uptime, especially thanks to rollbacks. Last but not least, it provides visibility and accountability: logs and deployment statuses can give you and your stakeholder precious insights to continuously improve processes.
At DeployHQ, we take monitoring seriously. Here is how to do it.
DeployHQ’s Native Monitoring Capabilities
Real-time notifications
The best monitoring runs in the background and alerts you only when something shifts. This is why DeployHQ offers real-time deployment notifications across a vast array of channels.
On DeployHQ, you can configure alerts the way they work best for you and your team, including:
Email notifications, the traditional way
Browser notifications, when you are just working in another tab
Third-party apps notifications, each with their perks. Depending on your choice, you can push deployment alerts directly into a team’s channel, create custom messages, and even trigger deployments from within the third-party service. DeployHQ offers several integrations, including Slack, Discord, Sentry, and Microsoft Teams.
Deployment logs + deployment reporting
We like a digital paper trail. With DeployHQ, every deployment generates logs, showing success/failure, changes, and durations. Historical logs are retained, so you can always find your way when troubleshooting and auditing.
One-click rollback
If you made a mistake and caught it too late, reverting is simple: pick a prior deployment, preview the diff, and click Rollback. DeployHQ restores deleted files, reverts modifications/additions—all automatically.
Promoting Zero Downtime
Optimizing your workflows becomes a lot easier with a Zero-Downtime-first approach. DeployHQ stages new releases and swaps them in only when complete, so that users are never left empty-handed.
Integrating External Monitoring Tools
Real-time monitoring is not only about messaging tools. DeployHQ offers various integrations with your workflow in mind, so you can tailor a release monitoring experience that works best for you and your team.
Popular integrations for optimal developer workflow optimization include:
Bugsnag: You can be notified of a new release and then track related errors in any Bugsnag project after the deployment has finished.
Sentry: On deploy, a "Release" is posted to the specified Sentry project via API.
New Relic: Set up automatic deployment reporting using just your Application ID and API Key.
Rollbacks and Recovery Strategy
With DeployHQ, your deployments are airtight.
There are several ways to recover your work:
Manual rollback: Simply navigate to the deployments page within your project, then click on the server name. Click View on the version you’d like to go back to, then select Rollback to this deployment.
Atomic deployments: Always keep the previous stable version live during deploy, and only flip the switch once it’s ready. Check out this guide to set it up properly.
Parallel and sequential strategies with server groups: If deploying to multiple servers you can choose sequential or parallel strategies. Sequential will deploy to each server in turn, while parallel will deploy to each server at the same time.
Notification + Reporting Workflow: an Example
Here’s how a typical DeployHQ setup will look for full visibility around your releases:
Connect your tools
Integrate Slack, Sentry, and New Relic (or any other integration) with your DeployHQ project. Each one handles a different piece of the release puzzle: alerts, error tracking, performance.Customize your triggers
Set DeployHQ to notify you (and your team) on deploy start, success, or failure. You can do this globally or per server.Deploy
When you push your changes, DeployHQ records the deployment in its activity logs: deployment status (success or failure), timestamps, file transfer steps, and associated metadata.Post-deploy actions are triggered
Slack sends a “deployment complete” message
DeployHQ automatically creates a new release in your Sentry project when a deployment has completed, so you can track what version of your app generated a specific exception.
New Relic gets a report of a new deployment automatically, so you can keep an eye on performance.
- If something goes wrong
Check your logs to trace what changed and roll back with one click if needed, no digging through files and no downtime.
Best Monitoring Practices + Ongoing Reporting
Here are some best practices for when you want to get the best out of your monitoring.
1. Track core deployment metrics in DeployHQ UI
Deployment frequency (manual, webhook, or scheduled) helps you understand how often you're shipping code. Success vs. failure rates, clearly logged, can help you identify instability and negative trends.
Deployment duration is recorded with timestamps in logs, too, so that you can identify possible slow stages. You can measure rollback history by reviewing rollback actions directly in the UI.
2. Use real-time notifications to stay informed
Set up email, browser, and Slack/Discord/MS Teams notifications. Customize triggers (deploy start, success, or failure) to your team’s needs, and get immediate feedback without needing to watch the DeployHQ dashboard.
3. Monitor releases using external tools
Such as:
Sentry: Posts to the Releases section automatically via API after deploy.
Bugsnag: Links errors directly to the deployed version for traceability.
New Relic: Tags performance metrics per deployment automatically using App ID + API key.
4. Analyze trends and find issues before they affect production
Use DeployHQ with integrations to identify repeated errors tied to specific branches, a high rollback frequency focused on particular project areas, or a flaky/long-running servers. This way, you can improve your pipeline guided by real project data.
5. Document and enforce deployment governance
Make your monitoring strategy a department-wide thing! Use server groups to keep main tied to production, dev to staging, etc. Set up atomic deployments for maximum seamlessness. Periodically rely on logs and reporting for audits.
Conclusion
DeployHQ cares about your deployment strategy. This is why it provides strong native monitoring with logs, notifications, rollback, and atomic deployments.
Integrations like Sentry, New Relic, and BugSnag tie errors and performance issues to specific releases, so that you can have your pipeline under control at all times. Team notifications keep everyone informed across Slack, email, and more.
And if something goes wrong, you can rely on quick and seamless rollbacks and DeployHQ’s Zero Downtime deployment strategy, eliminating user impact with atomic swaps.
For auditing, you’ll always have the logs.
Ready to bulletproof your releases? Start your free trial and explore plans.
FAQs
Can I monitor my deployments in real time with DeployHQ?
Yes: you’ll know what’s happening the moment it happens. DeployHQ lets you set up real-time notifications via email, browser, or third-party tools like Slack, Discord, and Microsoft Teams. Choose when to get notified (start, success, failure) and keep your team in the loop without your eyes having to be on the dashboard.
Can I roll back to a previous version if something goes wrong?
Mistakes happen. That’s why DeployHQ gives you one-click rollback. Just find the deployment you want to undo, preview what changed, and click Rollback. Your files go back exactly how they were, no manual clean-up required.
Does DeployHQ support Zero Downtime deployments?
Yes. DeployHQ supports atomic deployments. Your new release gets staged in a separate directory and only goes live once everything’s good to go. That means users never see a broken state.
