Best PagerDuty Alternatives: Cut Costs with Rootly's AI

PagerDuty has long been a foundational tool in incident management. However, as technology evolves, its high costs and platform complexity have led many teams to search for better options [3]. Modern engineering teams need more than just alerting; they require AI-powered automation to reduce manual work, resolve incidents faster, and improve system reliability.

Rootly stands out as a leading PagerDuty alternative, specifically designed to cut costs and streamline the entire incident lifecycle with intelligent automation. With other major tools like Opsgenie also being re-evaluated due to their uncertain future, the search for the right on-call software has become more critical than ever.

Why Are Teams Searching for PagerDuty Alternatives?

While PagerDuty is a recognized market leader, its platform isn't the right fit for every organization, especially those looking to scale efficiently without a proportional increase in spending [5]. The reasons teams are exploring PagerDuty alternatives often come down to cost, a need for modern features, and a desire for better integration.

1. Prohibitive Costs and Complex Pricing

PagerDuty's pricing can quickly become a significant operational expense, particularly for growing teams that need to add more users and capabilities. Its feature-gated plans often mean that accessing advanced functionalities—like analytics and process automation—requires a substantial and often unpredictable budget increase [4]. This complexity makes it difficult for organizations to forecast costs and can limit access to the very tools designed to improve reliability.

2. Lack of Modern, AI-Driven Automation

Legacy platforms tend to focus heavily on alerting rather than providing end-to-end automated incident response. Today's engineering teams are looking for AI features that can automatically handle incident triage, execute runbooks, and even draft post-incident summaries. This intelligent automation is key to reducing Mean Time to Resolution (MTTR) and freeing up engineers from repetitive, manual tasks.

3. A Shift Towards Integrated, Collaborative Platforms

Engineers prefer tools that integrate seamlessly into their existing workflows, with chat platforms like Slack and Microsoft Teams becoming the central hubs for incident response. A fragmented toolchain that forces responders to jump between different applications can introduce friction and slow down resolution. Teams are increasingly looking for a single, unified platform where they can manage the entire incident lifecycle without context switching.

Top 5 Best PagerDuty Alternatives for 2026

For teams looking for better value and more advanced capabilities, here is a curated list of the top incident management tools that serve as strong alternatives to PagerDuty.

1. Rootly: The AI-Powered Leader

Description: Rootly is the best-in-class alternative, purpose-built for modern engineering teams. Its powerful AI engine automates manual tasks across the entire incident lifecycle, from detection and triage to resolution and learning.

Key Features:

• AI-driven workflows for automated incident creation, escalation, and runbook execution.
• Deep, bi-directional integration with Slack, turning it into a central command center for incident response.
• Cost-effective and transparent pricing plans that include powerful features without hidden fees.
• A complete, end-to-end platform covering everything from incident management to retrospectives.

Best For: Teams looking for an enterprise incident management solution that leverages AI to cut costs, reduce toil, and improve system reliability. You can see how Rootly stacks up against other tools in this incident management platform showdown.

2. Opsgenie: A Strong Contender Facing a Sunset

Description: Opsgenie has been a popular choice, especially for organizations already invested in the Atlassian ecosystem. Its strengths lie in flexible on-call scheduling and robust alerting capabilities.

The Catch: Atlassian has announced it is discontinuing Opsgenie, with sales stopping in 2025 and a full shutdown by 2027 [6]. This makes it a risky choice for long-term planning and has prompted many users to seek Opsgenie alternatives.

Best For: Teams already using Opsgenie who are now looking for a future-proof replacement.

3. Zenduty: A Feature-Rich, Budget-Friendly Option

Description: Zenduty presents itself as a cost-effective PagerDuty alternative known for a comprehensive feature set designed for fast-growing teams.

Key Features: It offers robust capabilities in alert management, complex on-call scheduling, and tools to foster a strong post-mortem culture [1].

Best For: Fast-growing teams and Site Reliability Engineers (SREs) who need powerful features without the enterprise price tag.

4. incident.io: The Slack-Native Solution

Description: incident.io is a platform built to operate entirely within Slack, offering a seamless and intuitive experience for teams that live in their chat client.

Key Features: Its main draws are its intuitive interface, automated timeline generation during incidents, and built-in stakeholder communication features.

Best For: Slack-centric organizations that want to standardize incident response workflows directly within their primary communication tool.

5. Squadcast: A Focus on SRE and Reliability

Description: Squadcast is another alternative that centers on Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) principles, designed to improve system reliability and streamline on-call duties.

Key Features: The platform emphasizes reducing alert fatigue and providing clear visibility across the entire technology stack [8].

Best For: Developer and SRE teams focused on reliability management and looking for a developer-friendly incident response tool.

Alert Management Software Comparison: Rootly vs. The Field

When evaluating alternatives, it's crucial to compare key functionalities. Here’s how Rootly stands out in a direct alert management software comparison.

AI and Automation

• Rootly: Rootly uses AI to automate repetitive tasks that consume valuable engineering time. This includes automatically creating incident channels, inviting the right responders based on service ownership, pulling in diagnostic data, and even drafting retrospective narratives. These automation workflows reduce cognitive load and significantly lower MTTR.
• PagerDuty/Others: While competitors offer some automation, it is often rule-based and requires significant manual setup. It lacks the intelligence to adapt to novel situations, meaning engineers still need to intervene frequently.

On-Call Management and Escalations

• Rootly: Rootly provides flexible and intuitive on-call scheduling, multi-layered escalation policies, and live call routing to ensure alerts never get missed. Its ability to sync with Slack user groups makes on-call schedules visible and accessible to the entire team. You can get started with these features quickly.
• PagerDuty/Opsgenie: These tools are known for robust on-call features. However, Rootly’s modern, integrated approach offers the best oncall software for teams seeking a balance of power and simplicity directly within their collaborative tools.

Cost-Effectiveness

• Rootly: Rootly delivers a higher return on investment by bundling advanced, AI-powered features into transparent and predictable pricing tiers. This model leads to direct cost savings over PagerDuty without sacrificing essential functionality.
• PagerDuty: As noted by many who seek alternatives, PagerDuty's costs can escalate quickly with team growth and the need for advanced features, making it a less predictable and often more expensive option in the long run [2].

Conclusion: Modernize Your Incident Management with Rootly

While PagerDuty established the incident response market, modern tools like Rootly now offer a more intelligent, automated, and cost-effective approach. With the announced discontinuation of Opsgenie, there has never been a better time to switch to a future-proof platform built for the demands of today's complex systems.

Rootly is the clear choice for teams looking to cut costs, eliminate manual toil, and build a more reliable organization with the power of AI. By automating the entire incident lifecycle, Rootly empowers engineers to focus on what matters most: resolving incidents and building better software.

Ready to see how Rootly's AI can transform your incident response? Start your free trial today.

‍