What is FreshGuard?

FreshGuard monitors your database tables and alerts you when data stops flowing. Instead of discovering stale dashboards hours later, you get notified within minutes.

Core Concepts

FreshGuard is built around three concepts: sources, rules, and alerts.

Sources

A source is a connection to one of your databases. FreshGuard connects using read-only credentials and periodically queries your tables to check data freshness.

Supported databases:

Database	Minimum Tier
BigQuery	Free+
DuckDB	Free+
MySQL	Starter+
Snowflake	Starter+
SQL Server	Starter+
Azure SQL	Starter+
PostgreSQL	Professional+
Redshift	Professional+
Synapse Analytics	Professional+

Rules

A rule defines what to check and how often. Each rule targets a specific table on a source and runs on a schedule. Rule types include:

• Freshness Check Free+ — Alert when a table hasn’t been updated within a tolerance window (e.g. “this table should update at least every 2 hours”).
• Volume Threshold Starter+ — Alert when the row count in a table falls below or exceeds a static threshold.
• Volume Anomaly Professional+ — ML-powered detection that learns your table’s normal volume patterns and alerts on deviations.
• Schema Change Detection Professional+ — Alert when columns are added, removed, or changed.

Alerts

When a rule detects a problem, FreshGuard fires an alert. Alerts are sent to one or more destinations — email, Slack, or webhooks — depending on your plan.

How It Works

1. You connect a database and create rules for the tables you care about.
2. FreshGuard runs each rule on its configured schedule (e.g. every hour).
3. If a check fails — for example, a table hasn’t been updated within its freshness tolerance — an alert is created.
4. The alert is dispatched to your configured destinations (email, Slack, webhook).
5. When the issue resolves (data starts flowing again), FreshGuard sends a recovery notification so you know things are back to normal.

Workspaces

Every FreshGuard account operates within a workspace. A workspace isolates your sources, rules, alerts, and team members from other customers. You can invite teammates and assign them Admin or Member roles.

Next Steps

Ready to get started? Follow the Quickstart guide to set up monitoring in under five minutes.