Disk Space

Disk Space alerts watch your Channels DVR storage and notify you when free space drops below configurable thresholds. Two severity levels let you act early on a warning before a critical condition interrupts recordings.

Severity levels

ChannelWatch uses two severity levels for disk alerts.

Severity	Default threshold	Emoji
Warning	Below 10% free or below 50 GB free	⚠️
Critical	Below 5% free or below 25 GB free	🚨

A threshold fires when free space drops below either the percent value or the GB value, whichever is reached first. Critical takes priority: if free space is already below the critical threshold, only a Critical alert is sent, not a Warning.

Notification format

Warning alert:

⚠️ Low Disk Space Warning
Free Space: 200.59 GB / 1.82 TB (10.8%)
Used Space: 1.62 TB
DVR Path: /shares/DVR

Critical alert:

🚨 Low Disk Space Critical
Free Space: 18.42 GB / 1.82 TB (1.0%)
Used Space: 1.80 TB
DVR Path: /shares/DVR

Both formats show free space, total capacity, the percentage free, used space, and the DVR storage path.

Startup grace period

ChannelWatch waits until startup has settled before sending disk alerts. If a low-space condition already exists when the container starts, no notification is sent until the startup grace period has passed. This prevents a flood of alerts every time the container restarts on a system that is already low on space.

The default grace period is 10 seconds. You can adjust it in Settings > Disk Space Monitoring > Advanced.

Cooldown and worsening logic

Once a warning or critical alert has been sent, ChannelWatch does not keep repeating the same alert unless the condition gets meaningfully worse within that same severity level. Specifically, a repeat notification at the same severity requires both:

1. Free space has dropped by at least 1 GB or 1 percentage point since the last notification at that severity.
2. The cooldown period has elapsed since the last notification (default: 1 hour).

If disk space recovers to normal and then drops below a threshold again later, a fresh alert fires regardless of the cooldown. Escalating from warning to critical also sends a new alert immediately, without waiting for the cooldown.

Note

The cooldown applies per-severity. An escalation from warning to critical always fires immediately. A return to normal resets the state so the next breach sends a fresh alert.

Advanced settings

All disk alert thresholds and timing values are configurable in the web UI under Settings > Disk Space Monitoring > Advanced:

• Warning threshold (percent and GB)
• Critical threshold (percent and GB)
• Startup grace period
• Worsening sensitivity (minimum drop in GB or percent before a repeat alert)
• Cooldown period
• Optional separate test destination for disk alert tests

Testing

You can send a test disk alert from the Diagnostics tab in the web UI. Test notifications are clearly labeled with [TEST] in the title so they are easy to distinguish from real alerts:

⚠️ [TEST] Low Disk Space Warning
Free Space: 200.59 GB / 1.82 TB (10.8%)
Used Space: 1.62 TB
DVR Path: /shares/DVR

If you configure an optional test destination in the advanced disk settings, test alerts go to that destination instead of your normal notification route. If no override is set, test alerts use the normal route.

From the command line:

docker exec -it channelwatch python -m channelwatch.main --test-alert ALERT_DISK_SPACE

Troubleshooting

If disk space alerts are not arriving:

• Confirm Disk Space alerts are enabled in Settings > Alert Types.
• Check that your notification provider credentials are valid using the Diagnostics tab.
• If alerts are firing too frequently, increase the cooldown or worsening sensitivity in the advanced settings.
• If alerts are not firing at all after startup, verify the startup grace period has passed and that free space is actually below a configured threshold.
• Check container logs for API connectivity errors: docker logs channelwatch.