Is PingZen a good Datadog alternative?

For uptime monitoring specifically, yes. PingZen is free with 22 protocols. Datadog is an enterprise observability platform — overkill for just uptime checks.

How much does Datadog cost for monitoring?

Datadog infrastructure starts at $23/host/month. Synthetic monitoring costs $5/1000 tests. PingZen offers unlimited uptime monitoring completely free.

Can PingZen replace Datadog?

For uptime monitoring — yes. PingZen can't replace Datadog's APM, log management, or infrastructure monitoring. Many teams use both: PingZen for uptime, Datadog for observability.

Does Datadog have a free tier?

Datadog's free tier includes 5 hosts for infrastructure monitoring with limited features. Synthetic monitoring requires a paid plan. PingZen is entirely free with no limits.

PingZen vs Datadog: Uptime Monitoring vs Full Observability

Datadog is a full-stack observability platform with 47,000+ customers and 51.8% market share in data center management. Offers infrastructure monitoring, APM, log management, and synthetic monitoring.

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Quick Comparison

Best Value

PingZen

Price: Free forever
Intervals: 30 seconds
Protocols: 22 protocols
Alerts: 12+ channels

Datadog

Price: From $23/host/month
Intervals: 1 minute
Protocols: ~5 synthetic
Alerts: 20+ channels

Feature Comparison

Feature Comparison
Feature	PingZen	Datadog
HTTP/HTTPS monitoring
TCP monitoring
DNS monitoring
SSL certificate monitoring
WebSocket monitoring
gRPC monitoring
WHOIS domain expiry
Full APM Application Performance Monitoring
AI anomaly detection
120+ integrations
Telegram alerts
Slack integration
PagerDuty integration
Discord webhooks
Public status pages
Free tier	Unlimited	Limited (5 hosts)

Why Choose PingZen

100% free — no per-host pricing surprises
Simpler setup (no agent installation)
22 uptime protocols vs ~5 synthetic checks
Telegram, Discord, WhatsApp alerts
No vendor lock-in
Free public status pages

When Datadog is Better

Full APM with distributed tracing
120+ integrations (AWS, GCP, Azure)
AI-powered anomaly detection
60+ global monitoring locations
Enterprise compliance (SOC2, HIPAA, FedRAMP)
Custom dashboards and visualizations
Log management and SIEM

Not sure about PingZen vs Datadog?

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Migration Tip

If you only need uptime monitoring, PingZen does it free. Datadog is for teams needing full observability — APM, logs, infrastructure monitoring, and more.