Verify Redirect URL in Uptime Checks

We’ve just rolled out a helpful new setting to give you tighter control over how uptime is measured: Redirect URL Validation.

Why This Matters

By default, our uptime checks follow redirects and consider the site "up" as long as a 200 OK response is reached—regardless of what the final URL is.

But for some workflows, infrastructure setups or security models, ensuring the final destination matches a specific URL is critical. For example:

• You expect all traffic from https://example.com to land on https://www.example.com
• You're routing through CDNs, reverse proxies or edge workers and want to verify the correct endpoint is reached
• You're enforcing domain-level canonicalization

Introducing: expected_final_redirect_url Setting

Oh Dear has been able to verify the maximum number of redirects allowed before marking the site as "down".

With the new expected_final_redirect_url setting we will now inspect the full redirect chain during each uptime check. If the final URL doesn’t exactly match what you’ve configured, the site will be marked as down.

"expected_final_redirect_url": "https://www.example.com"

If the final resolved URL is anything other than https://www.example.com the check fails.

How it works

You can configure this setting in the dashboard under your site's uptime check settings or via the API.

PUT /api/sites/{site_id}

{
  "uptime_check_redirect_url": "https://www.example.com"
}

What Happens If It Doesn't Match?

If the resolved URL doesn't match the configured redirect_url exactly:

• The site will be marked 'down'
• The status page (if used) will reflect the downtime
• Your configured notifications will be triggered just like with any other failure

What's next?

👉 Have questions or ideas for other advanced uptime rules? Reach out to us via support as we’d love to hear them.

Happy monitoring!