SSL certificate monitoring
SSL renewals are easy—until they’re not. Monitoring.app keeps you ahead of certificate expiry and helps you catch the common edge cases that cause browser warnings: hostname mismatches, incomplete chains, and multi-domain (SAN) surprises.
Certificate issues don’t fail gracefully
A certificate can be “fine” for weeks and then instantly become a business incident: browsers block the site, users stop signing in, and the first notification is a client call.
- • Expired certificates cause hard outages (not just a warning).
- • Renewals sometimes fail silently (DNS, rate limits, ACME challenges).
- • Misconfigurations can affect only some clients (older devices, strict TLS stacks).
What we monitor
We inspect the certificate presented by your HTTPS endpoints and alert you early when something looks risky.
- • Expiry (days left) with early warnings before the deadline.
- • Hostname mismatch basics (CN/SAN vs the domain you’re monitoring).
- • Chain issues (missing intermediate certificates that trigger trust errors).
- • Multi-domain / SAN certificates (one cert, many hostnames—extra failure modes).
How it works
Monitor a website, portal, or API hostname (for example: client.example.com).
On each check we look at the certificate dates, the hostname it’s valid for, and the chain presented by the server.
Receive reminders well in advance (for example 30/14/7 days) so renewals don’t become a last-minute scramble.
Edge cases we help you avoid
The certificate is valid for a different domain than the one users visit. This happens after migrations, CDN changes, or when the wrong cert gets deployed.
Some servers forget to serve the intermediate certificate. Many clients fail the trust check, even if the leaf cert is valid.
One cert covers many hostnames. Great for management—until a renewal or replacement misses one of the names and breaks a subset of sites.
Who needs SSL monitoring?
Protect client sites and avoid the “why is the website insecure?” panic when a renewal fails over the weekend.
Get early warnings across environments (prod + staging) and catch mismatch/chain issues after infrastructure changes.
If your website or portal is your revenue pipeline, SSL failures are outages. Automated reminders are cheaper than emergencies.
FAQ
How early do you alert before a certificate expires?
You should get alerts weeks in advance, not the day before. Monitoring.app supports early warnings so you can act in a calm window (for example at 30, 14, and 7 days before expiry).
What about Let’s Encrypt renewals—aren’t those automatic?
Often yes, but automation can fail (DNS changes, ACME challenges, rate limits, expired credentials, server rebuilds). SSL monitoring is the safety net that tells you when “automatic” stopped being automatic.
Do you monitor wildcard certificates and SAN certificates?
Yes. Many teams use a single SAN or wildcard certificate to cover multiple hostnames. That’s convenient, but it also means one broken renewal can impact many services—so visibility matters.
Is hostname mismatch the same as an expired certificate?
No. A hostname mismatch happens when the certificate doesn’t include the domain your users visit (in the CN or SAN list). The cert may be unexpired, but browsers still show a blocking warning.
Can SSL issues affect only some users?
Yes. Chain issues and trust store differences can show up on specific devices or networks. Monitoring helps catch these problems before they turn into support tickets.
Add your first HTTPS endpoint and get calm, early reminders before certificates expire.