---
title: Alarms guide
description: Learn how to create Honeybadger alarms to monitor your Insights data in real time.
url: https://docs.honeybadger.io/guides/insights/alarms/
---

Insights alarms allow you to monitor your data in real time and get notified under the conditions you set. Your Honeybadger data, such as errors, deployments, and uptime checks, are already available to query. To learn how to send your own custom data to Honeybadger, see the [Getting started guide](https://docs.honeybadger.io/guides/insights/). Then, you can create alarms for anything your business needs.

![Alarms dashboard](https://docs.honeybadger.io/_astro/alarms-overview.Ceggcxr9_g1jfW.webp)

## Viewing an alarm

Alarms combine a [BadgerQL](https://docs.honeybadger.io/guides/insights/badgerql/) query (“count all slow requests in the past five minutes”) with a threshold (“when count is > 2”) and trigger alerts when the query result exceeds the threshold.

![Alarms chart](https://docs.honeybadger.io/_astro/alarms-chart.Kudz72Aq_Z1X0J13.webp)

In the above chart, the red line is the threshold for the alarm state. This query was in an alarm state for one period in the last hour but recently recovered.

## Creating or updating an alarm

### Query and timing

Construct a `query` using [BadgerQL](https://docs.honeybadger.io/guides/insights/badgerql/) to return data you wish to monitor. You may want to use a `filter` function to isolate the relevant data.

![Alarms query](https://docs.honeybadger.io/_astro/alarms-query.Coj32v_v_1WumSn.webp)

Use the `interval` field to specify the time window for the query. The `interval` field is a string that represents the time window for the query. The format is `1d`, `1h`, `1m`, etc. In other words, the `interval` is both the frequency and the time period over which the query is executed.

The `lag` field can be used to delay the query execution by a specified time period. The `lag` field is also a string that represents the time delay for the query. The format is `1d`, `1h`, `1m`, etc. This is useful when you want to wait for slow or late data arriving.

![Alarms timing](https://docs.honeybadger.io/_astro/alarms-timing.Cel4pwrt_ZwbKhl.webp)

### Result count

Alarms are triggered based on the number of results returned by the query. You can specify the logical comparison operator (`>`, `>=`, `<`, `<=`, `==`, `!=`) and a value count. The alarm will trigger when the number of results meets the condition.

![Alarms result count](https://docs.honeybadger.io/_astro/alarms-result-count.CV4PeM8T_Z2poEvs.webp)

### Description

It may be helpful to provide a description of the alarm to help you remember its purpose. The description is also delivered as part of the notification when you have integrations setup. Some useful information would be what the alarm is monitoring, what to do when the alarm triggers, and who to contact.

## History

The **History** tab on an alarm lists evaluations that changed its state, newest first. Each row shows when the evaluation window started, the state the alarm was in afterwards (`ok`, `alarm`, or `error`), and the result the query returned for that window.

Each row also has a **Results** link that opens the Insights query page with the alarm’s query, scoped to the alarm’s streams and to the exact time window that evaluation covered. Use it to see the events behind a check, for example to find out which requests pushed an error-rate alarm over its threshold.

The chart at the top of the alarm page offers the same link: hover over a segment of the status bar under the chart and the tooltip shows **Results** for that period.

## Integrations

Integrations is where you can configured how to be notified when an alarm changes state. There are two states per integration that can be configured: `ok` and `alert`.

All users can update their personal notification integrations (email, etc.), while users with administrator access to the project can manage the alert settings for all of the project’s integrations.

![Alarms integrations](https://docs.honeybadger.io/_astro/alarms-integrations.CyaPev7k_9pldr.webp)

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