For modern engineering teams, maintaining system reliability and uptime is non-negotiable. On-call management acts as the first line of defense when incidents occur, but poor management practices can lead to significant challenges. Teams often struggle with alert fatigue—especially when only a small fraction of alerts require urgent attention—slow response times, engineer burnout, and chaotic incident response [7]. The solution lies in specialized on-call software designed to automate scheduling, streamline alerting, and coordinate responses efficiently.
This article explores what makes on-call software effective and compares the best options available for engineering teams today, helping you choose a tool that builds a culture of reliability, not reactivity.
Key Features to Look for in On-Call Software
Before diving into specific tools, it's crucial to establish the essential features that define top-tier on-call software. These are the criteria teams should use to evaluate their options.
Flexible On-Call Scheduling
The core of any on-call tool is its ability to manage schedules effectively. Look for key scheduling features that offer both structure and flexibility:
- Rotations: Support for daily, weekly, and custom rotation cycles.
- Overrides: The ability for engineers to easily take over shifts or schedule overrides without disrupting the entire schedule.
- Time-Zone Awareness: Critical for distributed teams to ensure seamless handoffs across different geographic locations.
- Layered Coverage: Support for primary, secondary, and even tertiary responders to build redundancy.
A good system provides a clear, centralized view of who is on-call at any moment. These on-call schedules form the foundation of a predictable and resilient incident response system.
Reliable Alerting and Smart Escalation Policies
Once a schedule is set, the software's primary job is to ensure alerts reach the right person reliably. This requires multi-channel notifications (e.g., phone calls, SMS, push notifications, Slack messages) to maximize reach. Just as important are escalation policies, which automatically route an alert to the next person or layer if the primary responder doesn't acknowledge it in time, preventing missed alerts.
Features like Do Not Disturb (DND) override for critical alerts are also necessary to cut through the noise. Ultimately, the right tool is one that fits your team's specific operational needs and real-world workflows [3].
Deep Integrations and Workflow Automation
On-call software doesn't operate in a vacuum. It must connect seamlessly with a team's existing toolchain. Critical integration categories include:
- Monitoring & Observability: Tools like Datadog, Grafana, Sentry, and New Relic to receive alerts.
- Communication: Slack and Microsoft Teams for notifications and collaboration.
- Ticketing: Jira, Linear, and ServiceNow to track follow-up work.
The best tools use these integrations to power automation. For instance, an alert can automatically create an incident, page the on-call engineer, and spin up a dedicated Slack channel. These incident workflows reduce manual work and let engineers focus on solving the problem.
Unified Incident Management Capabilities
Modern on-call management is more than just alerting; it’s about managing the entire incident lifecycle. The impact of AI is already being felt, with 32% of IT professionals reporting significant improvements in their incident management processes due to its integration [6].
Leading platforms incorporate incident response features directly, allowing teams to:
- Declare incidents (manually or automatically).
- Coordinate the response in a centralized place.
- Communicate with stakeholders.
- Conduct retrospectives to learn from incidents.
This unified approach reduces context switching and keeps all incident-related information in one place.
A Review of the Best On-Call Software for Teams
Based on the criteria above, here is a comparison of some of the leading on-call management tools for engineering teams.
Rootly: The All-in-One Platform for On-Call and Incident Response
Rootly is a comprehensive, end-to-end incident management platform that deeply integrates on-call management. It unifies all the necessary components: on-call schedules, escalation policies, multi-channel notifications, and live call routing. This holistic approach makes it one of the best on-call software solutions for teams [1].
Rootly's key differentiator is that it’s not just an alerting tool but a complete workflow engine that guides teams from alert detection through resolution and learning. By treating on-call management as an integral part of the broader incident lifecycle, Rootly helps teams automate manual tasks and resolve issues faster. You can get started with a platform designed for modern reliability engineering.
PagerDuty: The Established Leader in Alerting
As one of the pioneers in the on-call space, PagerDuty is a well-known name with strengths in robust alerting, extensive integrations, and mature scheduling capabilities. It is a powerful tool for organizations focused primarily on the alerting and notification aspect of on-call management [2]. While PagerDuty has added incident response features over time, they can sometimes feel less integrated compared to platforms built holistically around the entire incident lifecycle.
Opsgenie: A Strong Contender for Atlassian Users
Opsgenie, now part of Atlassian, is another major player in the on-call and alerting market. Its tight integration with the Atlassian ecosystem makes it a natural choice for teams that heavily rely on Jira for ticketing and Confluence for documentation. It offers solid features for on-call scheduling, alerting rules, and reporting, making it a capable solution for many organizations.
Other Notable Tools
- TaskCall: This tool focuses on helping DevOps teams manage uptime with features for dynamic on-call schedules and escalation policies to ensure no alert goes unaddressed [4].
- Connecteam: Often geared towards service-based businesses, Connecteam is an all-in-one platform with scheduling and communication features that can be adapted for on-call needs, especially for teams managing field operations [1].
Why a Unified Approach Matters: Rootly's Advantage
The trend in incident management is moving away from siloed tools and toward unified platforms that reduce complexity and improve efficiency.
From Alert to Resolution in One Workflow
Rootly connects the dots between an incoming alert and the entire incident response process. A typical automated flow is seamless: an alert from Datadog triggers a Rootly workflow, which pages the on-call engineer via their preferred channel, creates a dedicated Slack channel, assigns an incident commander, and pulls in a runbook—all automatically. This ensures that incidents are managed consistently and efficiently from start to finish.
Centralized and Empowered Teams
A unified platform also empowers teams with autonomy while maintaining central governance. Rootly allows individual teams to be managed with their own on-call schedules and escalation policies. This promotes ownership and allows teams to tailor processes to their specific services and needs, all within a single, coherent platform.
Conclusion: Choosing the Right Software for Your Engineering Team
Selecting the best on-call software is crucial for building a reliable and resilient engineering culture. While standalone alerting tools like PagerDuty and Opsgenie are powerful, the future lies in integrated platforms that manage the entire incident lifecycle.
Rootly stands out as the ideal choice for modern engineering teams looking for an all-in-one solution that combines flexible on-call management with powerful incident response automation. By moving beyond basic paging to embrace a holistic approach, teams can streamline on-call duties and resolve incidents faster.
Explore how Rootly can help your team transform its incident management processes [2].