How to add a site and read the first health check

The short answer

Add the site from the dashboard with a name, the public URL, and a description if you want one. DashCanopy starts health checks on that URL. The first thing to read is whether the check comes back online, degraded, or offline. Visitor counts and revenue stay empty until you connect a stats endpoint, the WordPress plugin, or another reporting path. An empty stat is not a failed launch.

Do this for one site and read the result before you paste in the rest of the portfolio. A wrong URL copied eleven times is eleven wrong tiles.

Before you click Add Site

Decide which URL represents “this property answers.” For a brochure site, that is usually the homepage. For an app, it might be the login screen or a public status route that does not require a session. For a store, the storefront home is the usual check, not the admin. The checker requests the URL you save. It does not know which page you meant.

Use the public address customers use, including https when that is what the site serves. If the host redirects http to https, you can still monitor the https URL directly so the check is about the site, not about the redirect. Open the URL in a private window first. If you cannot see it without a password, the checker probably cannot either, and the tile will look offline on a site you personally can see while logged in.

Name the site the way you will scan it in a list. “Blog” is a weak name when you have four blogs. The publication’s name, or the hostname, is easier at 8 a.m. The description is optional. Use it for a note you will forget, such as “client: Northwind” or “campaign subdomain, expires in June,” not for a paragraph of marketing copy.

The getting started guide walks through the same add flow: the + Add Site control, name, URL, and optional description. It lives at Getting Started.

What the first check is allowed to mean

After the site is saved, wait for a check. You do not need to stare. Starter checks every 10 minutes, Pro every 5, and Agency every 1. The first result uses the same definitions as every later result, which online, degraded, and offline spells out. A success in under five seconds is online. A slow success is degraded. A failure is offline.

Read a first offline result as a setup clue until you prove it is a real outage. The usual causes on a brand-new tile are a URL typo, a host that blocks unknown clients, a certificate problem, or a site that is not actually deployed at that hostname yet. Open the URL. If it fails for you too, fix the site, not the dashboard. If it loads for you and the next check is still offline, adjust the monitored URL or the host’s allow rules. Then let another check run. Refreshing the dashboard does not shorten the plan interval.

A first degraded result on a host that sleeps is common. Load the site once, wait for the next check, and see whether it settles to online. If it stays slow, that is a host question. It is still a successful response.

What not to debug on minute one

Do not debug visitor or revenue numbers before a health check has succeeded. Those numbers are not part of the health request. They arrive when the site reports them. The guide describes a stats endpoint the dashboard can poll, returning visitors, revenue in cents, recent activity, and an optional sparkline. The WordPress plugin can push page views, WooCommerce or Easy Digital Downloads revenue, and response time on its own schedule. Until one of those is in place, dashes or zeros mean “no stats have been reported,” which the install notes already say.

Do not paste an admin URL as the monitored URL just because that is the tab you personally use. Monitoring /wp-admin will tell you whether the login screen responds. It will not tell you whether the public article responds. Add the public URL. If you also want a deep link into the admin for yourself, the guide mentions a dashboard URL field for that jump. That field is a bookmark. It is not the health check.

Do not add the same site twice under www and non-www unless you truly operate them as separate properties. Pick the canonical host. A duplicate tile doubles the noise and spends a slot on your plan cap.

Add the second site only after the first tile makes sense

When the first tile is online, or you understand why it is not, add the next URL. Keep a short list outside the dashboard while you do this — a note is enough — so you do not skip the docs host or add a staging site you intended to leave private. Staging hosts often refuse outside requests or are behind a login. Monitoring them can be useful for you, and it can also produce a permanent offline tile. Choose on purpose.

Plan caps apply as you add. Starter stops at 5 sites, Pro at 15, Agency does not state a site cap. If the add control will not take another site, you are at the cap. The fix is a higher plan or a shorter list, not a second account you then have to remember. Which plan matches which count is in choosing Starter, Pro, or Agency.

After the tile is online, connect stats if you need them

Health is the launch check. Stats are the next project, and they can wait until the next sitting if the goal today was “tell me if it is up.” When you are ready, pick one reporting path and test it on this site before you roll it out.

For WordPress, the plugin page documents the zip, the API key from Settings → API & Extension, and Settings → DashCanopy inside WordPress. The key starts with dck_. Save and register, then look for page views on the tile after the plugin has pushed. That setup is written out in the WordPress plugin walkthrough.

For anything else, use a stats endpoint or a platform path you have confirmed. The public platforms page lists WordPress, Shopify, Wix, Squarespace, Webflow, Ghost, Framer, and others, and it says compatibility depends on the platform and the access your plan there allows. “Any site” means a REST API, a JavaScript snippet, or a compatible stats endpoint — not that every builder has a one-click switch. Read Platforms before you promise a client their builder is covered.

A finished first site looks like this

You can name the tile without looking up the URL. The public URL loads in a private window. The latest check is online, or you have a written reason it is not. Stats are either showing reported numbers or clearly not connected yet. Email notifications are on, because they are part of the paid plans, so a later failure has somewhere to go besides the tile you might not be watching.

That is the whole first session. The portfolio gets more useful as you repeat it. It does not get more useful if you add twenty URLs you have not opened.

Questions about the first check

How soon should the first check appear?

Within one plan interval after the site is saved: 10 minutes on Starter, 5 on Pro, 1 on Agency. If you are testing a URL change, wait out that interval before you conclude the new URL failed.

Can I add a site I do not own?

Only monitor sites you operate or are allowed to check. A health check is an ordinary request to a public URL, and you are still responsible for pointing it at properties you are supposed to watch. The dashboard is not a tool for probing someone else’s network.

The site is online but the tile says unknown. What now?

Unknown means the dashboard does not have a completed check result yet, or it could not classify one. Wait for the next interval. If the state never resolves, confirm the saved URL opens, then use support with that URL and the time you added the site. Do not invent a traffic problem on top of a missing check.