---
name: dd-monitors
description: Monitor management - create, update, mute, and alerting best practices.
metadata:
  version: "1.0.0"
  author: datadog-labs
  repository: https://github.com/datadog-labs/agent-skills
  tags: datadog,monitors,alerting,alerts,dd-monitors
  globs: "**/datadog*.yaml,**/*monitor*"
  alwaysApply: "false"
---

# Datadog Monitors

Create, manage, and maintain monitors for alerting.


## Prerequisites
This requires Go or the pup binary in your path. 

`pup` - `go install github.com/datadog-labs/pup@latest`
Ensure `~/go/bin` is in `$PATH`.


## Quick Start

```bash
pup auth login
```

## Common Operations

### List Monitors

```bash
pup monitors list
pup monitors list --tags "team:platform"
pup monitors list --status "Alert"
```

### Get Monitor

```bash
pup monitors get <id> --json
```

### Create Monitor

```bash
pup monitors create \
  --name "High CPU on web servers" \
  --type "metric alert" \
  --query "avg(last_5m):avg:system.cpu.user{env:prod} > 80" \
  --message "CPU above 80% @slack-ops"
```

### Mute/Unmute

```bash
# Mute with duration
pup monitors mute --id 12345 --duration 1h

# Or mute with specific end time
pup monitors mute --id 12345 --end "2024-01-15T18:00:00Z"

# Unmute
pup monitors unmute --id 12345
```

## ⚠️ Monitor Creation Best Practices

### 1. Avoid Alert Fatigue

| Rule | Why |
|------|-----|
| **No flapping alerts** | Use `last_Xm` not `last_1m` |
| **Meaningful thresholds** | Based on SLOs, not guesses |
| **Actionable alerts** | If no action needed, don't alert |
| **Include runbook** | `@runbook-url` in message |

```python
# WRONG - will flap constantly
query = "avg(last_1m):avg:system.cpu.user{*} > 50"  # ❌ Too sensitive

# CORRECT - stable alerting
query = "avg(last_5m):avg:system.cpu.user{env:prod} by {host} > 80"  # ✅ Reasonable window
```

### 2. Use Proper Scoping

```python
# WRONG - alerts on everything
query = "avg(last_5m):avg:system.cpu.user{*} > 80"  # ❌ No scope

# CORRECT - scoped to what matters
query = "avg(last_5m):avg:system.cpu.user{env:prod,service:api} by {host} > 80"  # ✅
```

### 3. Set Recovery Thresholds

```python
monitor = {
    "query": "avg(last_5m):avg:system.cpu.user{env:prod} > 80",
    "options": {
        "thresholds": {
            "critical": 80,
            "critical_recovery": 70,  # ✅ Prevents flapping
            "warning": 60,
            "warning_recovery": 50
        }
    }
}
```

### 4. Include Context in Messages

```python
message = """
## High CPU Alert

Host: {{host.name}}
Current Value: {{value}}
Threshold: {{threshold}}

### Runbook
1. Check top processes: `ssh {{host.name}} 'top -bn1 | head -20'`
2. Check recent deploys
3. Scale if needed

@slack-ops @pagerduty-oncall
"""
```

## ⚠️ NEVER Delete Monitors Directly

Use safe deletion workflow (same as dashboards):

```python
def safe_mark_monitor_for_deletion(monitor_id: str, client) -> bool:
    """Mark monitor instead of deleting."""
    monitor = client.get_monitor(monitor_id)
    name = monitor.get("name", "")
    
    if "[MARKED FOR DELETION]" in name:
        print(f"Already marked: {name}")
        return False
    
    new_name = f"[MARKED FOR DELETION] {name}"
    client.update_monitor(monitor_id, {"name": new_name})
    print(f"✓ Marked: {new_name}")
    return True
```

## Monitor Types

| Type | Use Case |
|------|----------|
| `metric alert` | CPU, memory, custom metrics |
| `query alert` | Complex metric queries |
| `service check` | Agent check status |
| `event alert` | Event stream patterns |
| `log alert` | Log pattern matching |
| `composite` | Combine multiple monitors |
| `apm` | APM metrics |

## Audit Monitors

```bash
# Find monitors without owners
pup monitors list --json | jq '.[] | select(.tags | contains(["team:"]) | not) | {id, name}'

# Find noisy monitors (high alert count)
pup monitors list --json | jq 'sort_by(.overall_state_modified) | .[:10] | .[] | {id, name, status: .overall_state}'
```

## Downtime vs Muting

| Use | When |
|-----|------|
| **Mute monitor** | Quick one-off, < 1 hour |
| **Downtime** | Scheduled maintenance, recurring |

```bash
# Downtime (preferred)
pup downtime create \
  --scope "env:prod" \
  --monitor-tags "team:platform" \
  --start "2024-01-15T02:00:00Z" \
  --end "2024-01-15T06:00:00Z"
```

## Failure Handling

| Problem | Fix |
|---------|-----|
| Alert not firing | Check query returns data, thresholds |
| Too many alerts | Increase window, add recovery threshold |
| No data alerts | Check agent connectivity, metric exists |
| Auth error | `pup auth refresh` |

## References

- [Monitor Types](https://docs.datadoghq.com/monitors/types/)
- [Alerting Best Practices](https://docs.datadoghq.com/monitors/guide/)
- [SLO Monitors](https://docs.datadoghq.com/service_management/service_level_objectives/)