The price anchor
| Certwatch | SSLMate-style SSL monitors | |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly | $0 — no subscription | $10–20/mo |
| Annual | $0 after purchase | $180 |
| 5-year total | $24 | $900 |
| 10-year total | $24 | $1,800 |
Subscription figures from the vendor's published pricing ($10–20/mo, ~$180/yr); the Certwatch column is the full price, paid once.
Break-even analysis
Two months of a paid SSL monitor covers Certwatch, and one cert it saves from expiring covers the 2am page it would have cost you.
- After 1 year: Certwatch has cost you $24 total — SSLMate-style SSL monitors has cost $180.
- After 3 years: Certwatch is still $24 — the subscription is at $540.
- After 5 years: Certwatch is still $24 — the subscription is at $900.
What you get for $24 once
- Traffic-light dashboard. Green over 30 days, yellow at 30 or under, red under 7 days, or for expired, invalid or unreachable hosts.
- Real TLS handshake checks. Node tls checks expiry, issuer, SAN list, chain validity, self-signed certs and weak keys (RSA under 2048, EC under 224).
- Domain WHOIS expiry. Best-effort registry lookups so the domain registration itself does not lapse either.
- Threshold alerts. Configurable days (default 30, 14, 7, 1) via webhook and SMTP email, with exactly one alert per threshold per certificate.
- Chain viewer. See the full presented certificate chain per check in the UI.
- No renewal, ever. The license does not expire and there is no per-seat meter — $24 is the whole price.
Pricing questions
Is it really free on GitHub?
Yes. Certwatch is MIT-licensed at github.com/bensblueprints/ssl-cert-monitor-mvp and always will be. The $24 buys the packaged 1-click installer; building from source is free.
Where does my monitoring data live?
In a SQLite database on your own server. The checker connects directly to your hosts, so run it from a box that can reach them, and nothing goes to any third-party API.
How reliable is the domain-expiry check?
Certificate checks are the reliable signal. WHOIS domain expiry is best-effort: some TLDs publish no expiry and some rate-limit, so treat it as a bonus rather than the primary alarm.
Is this a subscription in disguise?
No. $24 once, no renewal, no per-domain tiering, no license server. Webhooks work with zero config; deploy it and it keeps watching your certs.
Certwatch — $24, one time
Or get Certwatch plus every other app in the suite: the OneTimeSuite bundle is currently $97, one time.