Keep an eye on things with Heartbeat
Have the assistant watch for what matters and ping you only when it finds something.
Intermediate · ~10 min · Prerequisites: None
What you'll do
Create a Heartbeat check that runs on a schedule, evaluates a condition you define, and notifies you only when that condition is true — staying completely silent the rest of the time.
What Heartbeat is for
A recurring summary always produces output. Heartbeat is different: it checks for something and stays quiet unless it finds it.
Use Heartbeat when:
- You want to be notified only if a specific condition is true ("alert me if there are any unresolved blockers").
- You're watching for an event that might not happen for days ("ping me when the design doc is updated").
- You want ambient awareness without daily noise.
For regular digests that always deliver output, use a recurring summary instead. For the technical details of how Heartbeat works, see the Heartbeat reference.
Create a check
Ask the assistant to create a Heartbeat by describing the condition and the interval:
- "Check every hour whether any task in the Q3 project is overdue, and notify me if so."
- "Every morning, look at my inbox and alert me only if there's something from the leadership team."
- "Watch for changes to the product spec document and tell me when it's updated."
The assistant creates a named check and confirms: the name, condition, interval, and what it will say when it fires.
Give the check a clear name — "Q3 blocker watch" — so you can find and manage it later.
Stay quiet unless it matters
When a Heartbeat runs and the condition is not true, you get nothing. No notification, no noise.
When the condition is true, a notification lands in your Inbox with the check name and the specific finding — not just "something happened," but what the assistant actually found.
You can tune the sensitivity in your prompt: "Only notify me if there are more than three overdue tasks" or "Skip it if the only update is a formatting change."
Manage checks
Ask the assistant to change, pause, or delete a check at any time:
- "Pause the Q3 blocker watch until next sprint."
- "Change the interval to every 30 minutes."
- "Delete the product spec watch."
You can also view and toggle your checks directly from the Heartbeat reference page.