Sign In

On-Call Scheduling Overview

Automate 24/7 on-call coverage with intelligent shift scheduling and flexible rotation algorithms.

Upstat’s On-Call System enables teams to maintain continuous operational coverage through automated shift scheduling, intelligent rotation algorithms, and seamless integration with incident response workflows.

What is On-Call Scheduling?

On-call scheduling determines who is responsible for responding to alerts and incidents at any given time. Upstat automates this process by:

  • Generating shift schedules based on rotation rules and user availability
  • Managing rosters with multiple concurrent users and timezone support
  • Handling overrides for temporary coverage changes
  • Excluding holidays automatically from shift generation
  • Routing alerts to the correct on-call personnel

Key Concepts

Rosters

A roster defines a repeating on-call schedule for a specific set of users. Each roster:

  • Belongs to a single project
  • Contains a list of users who rotate through shifts
  • Has its own rotation rules (weekly, sequential, fair distribution)
  • Operates in a specific timezone
  • Can run concurrently with other rosters for multi-tier coverage

You can create multiple rosters per project to represent different teams, shifts, or escalation paths such as “Primary Engineering,” “Backup Support,” or “EU Coverage.”

Learn more about Creating Rosters →

Shift Rotations

Upstat supports multiple rotation strategies to match your team’s needs:

Sequential Rotation: Users rotate in exact order (User A → User B → User C → User A). Simple round-robin pattern.

Weekly Rotation: Each user’s shifts advance by one position each week, ensuring everyone experiences different days and times.

Fair Distribution: Shifts spread evenly across scheduled days, maximizing time between each user’s shifts for balanced workload.

Learn more about Shift Rotations →

Concurrent Users

Configure how many users are assigned to each shift simultaneously:

  • Single user provides individual responsibility and clear ownership
  • Multiple users enable redundancy and shared workload during shifts

Coverage Options

Fill 24 Hours Mode

Generate multiple shifts per day to provide continuous 24-hour coverage. Shift duration determines the number of daily shifts (8-hour duration creates 3 shifts per day).

Single Shift Mode

Generate exactly one shift per scheduled day, regardless of duration. This mode works for teams that don’t require 24/7 monitoring and intentionally leaves coverage gaps.

Managing Availability

User Overrides

Temporary substitutions when someone needs to swap shifts or cover for another team member:

  • Override another user’s assigned shift for specific dates
  • Takes highest priority in shift assignment
  • Can rescue excluded assignments
  • Supersedes all rotation logic

Learn more about Substitutions →

Exclusions

Manage time off and unavailability at two levels:

Roster-Wide Exclusions: Company holidays and maintenance windows prevent shift generation entirely. No shifts created for any user on these dates.

User-Specific Exclusions: Individual vacation and unavailability removes specific users from their assigned shifts. Rotation continues to next available user.

Learn more about Holidays and Time Off →

Timezone Support

All rosters operate in a specific IANA timezone with automatic daylight saving time handling:

  • Internal storage in UTC for global consistency
  • Display in configured timezone for each roster
  • Automatic DST transitions
  • Support for follow-the-sun coverage across regions

Create multiple rosters in different timezones for true global coverage with coordinated handoffs between regional teams.

Learn more about Timezones →

Integration with Incident Response

On-call schedules automatically integrate with other Upstat features:

Alert Routing: Incidents and alerts route to active on-call personnel based on current shifts

Auto-Assignment: New incidents can auto-assign to whoever is on-call

Shift Notifications: Get reminders before your shift starts and handoff alerts when it ends

Timeline Context: On-call assignments appear in incident timelines for full context

Common Use Cases

Primary and Backup Coverage

Create two rosters:

  • “Primary Engineers” for first-line response
  • “Backup Engineers” for escalation if primary doesn’t respond

Follow-the-Sun Coverage

Set up regional rosters:

  • “APAC Team” (08:00-17:00 SGT)
  • “EMEA Team” (08:00-17:00 CET)
  • “Americas Team” (08:00-17:00 PST)

Each team covers their working hours in their local timezone with automatic handoffs.

Tiered Support

Different rosters for different severity levels:

  • “Tier 1 Support” for all incidents
  • “Senior Engineering” for critical incidents only
  • “Leadership” for major outages

Getting Started

  1. Create your first roster with a name, users, and rotation rules
  2. Configure rotation settings (type, shift duration, concurrent users)
  3. Set the timezone for your team’s location
  4. Preview the schedule to verify shifts generate correctly
  5. Connect to alerting so incidents route to on-call users

Create Your First Roster →

Summary

Upstat’s On-Call System provides:

  • Automated scheduling with multiple rotation strategies
  • Flexible coverage with concurrent users and multi-roster support
  • Global timezone handling with automatic DST transitions
  • Override management for temporary changes
  • Holiday integration for automatic exclusions
  • Incident integration for alert routing and auto-assignment

The system eliminates manual scheduling overhead while ensuring continuous coverage and automatically routing alerts to the right personnel at the right time.

Learn More