A heartbeat is a lightweight status message sent by the remFREE agent to show that the endpoint is alive and communicating with the platform.
Heartbeats are one of the fundamental signals remFREE uses to understand device availability.
What does a heartbeat tell remFREE?
A successful heartbeat can provide information such as:
- the endpoint is currently communicating with remFREE
- the remFREE agent is running
- the current agent version
- the most recent successful contact time
This information allows remFREE to maintain a current operational view of the managed fleet.
Heartbeats are intentionally lightweight
A heartbeat is not a complete inventory scan.
It does not mean remFREE collects every hardware detail, application, patch, or compliance value every time the device checks in.
Those are separate workflows.
Keeping the heartbeat small allows endpoints to check in regularly without repeatedly performing expensive collection tasks.
Online and offline status
A device is considered online when remFREE has received sufficiently recent communication from its agent.
If communication stops for long enough, the device will appear offline.
Offline does not necessarily mean the endpoint has failed.
Common reasons include:
- the computer is powered off
- the computer is sleeping
- network connectivity is unavailable
- the remFREE agent service is stopped
- a firewall or proxy is interrupting communication
- secure WebSocket communication is unavailable
Why heartbeat and job status are separate
Presence and execution answer different questions.
A heartbeat answers:
Is this endpoint communicating with remFREE?
A job answers:
Did this endpoint perform a requested action?
A machine may be online while a particular job fails.
Likewise, an offline device may still have historical inventory, compliance, and job information available in remFREE.
Agent version reporting
Heartbeat communication can also help remFREE understand which agent version is running on the endpoint.
remFREE manages its agent release policy centrally so customers do not need to manually maintain agent versions across the fleet.
Heartbeat interval
The heartbeat interval is controlled by remFREE platform policy.
Tenant administrators may see the configured value in Tenant Settings, but the interval itself is managed by remFREE.
This keeps connection behavior predictable across the platform.
Troubleshooting missing heartbeats
If a device unexpectedly appears offline, verify:
- the endpoint is powered on
- the remFREE agent service is running
- DNS resolution is working
- outbound TCP 443 is permitted
- WebSocket connections are allowed
- TLS inspection is not breaking the session
The endpoint should be able to communicate with:
https://rmm.remfree.com
and:
wss://rmm.remfree.com/ws
For a complete checklist, see Troubleshooting Agent Connectivity.