External Monitoring
External monitoring is the practice of tracking the performance, availability, and functionality of applications, services, or systems from outside their internal network, simulating real user interactions. It involves using external agents or probes to periodically check endpoints, APIs, websites, or infrastructure components from various geographic locations. This provides an objective view of how systems perform for end-users and helps detect issues that internal monitoring might miss.
Developers should use external monitoring to ensure their applications are accessible and performant for users globally, especially for customer-facing web services, APIs, or cloud-based systems. It is critical for detecting downtime, slow response times, or functional failures from a user's perspective, enabling proactive incident response and SLA compliance. Common use cases include uptime monitoring for e-commerce sites, performance testing for mobile apps, and API health checks for microservices architectures.