Crowswatch
Google Cloud

Stack Monitors

Monitor Google Cloud with Crowswatch

Monitor Compute Engine, Cloud Run, and Cloud CDN performance and health metrics across your Google Cloud projects directly from Crowswatch.

What This Integration Provides

  • Compute Engine: VM instance CPU, memory, disk, and network utilisation
  • Cloud Run: request count, latency, error rate, and container instance count
  • Cloud CDN: cache hit rate, egress, and request volume
  • Cloud SQL: connection count, query latency, and storage usage
  • Alerting policies: active alert policy state across your project
  • Uptime checks: configured uptime check status and latency

Requirements

RequirementDetail
Google Cloud accountAny tier
Service accountWith Monitoring Viewer role
JSON key fileDownloaded from the service account
Project IDThe GCP project you want to monitor
Estimated setup time~10 minutes

Step 1: Generate Credentials

Google Cloud uses service accounts with JSON key files for API authentication.

To create a service account:

  1. Log in to the Google Cloud Console
  2. Select the project you want to monitor from the project selector at the top
  3. Go to IAM & Admin → Service Accounts
  4. Click Create Service Account
  5. Enter a name (e.g. crowswatch-monitor) and an optional description
  6. Click Create and Continue
  7. In the Grant this service account access to project step, select the role: Monitoring → Monitoring Viewer (roles/monitoring.viewer)
  8. Click Continue, then Done

To create a JSON key:

  1. Click the service account you just created
  2. Go to the Keys tab
  3. Click Add Key → Create new key
  4. Select JSON and click Create
  5. The key file downloads automatically. Store it securely
  6. This file cannot be re-downloaded. If lost, create a new key
Monitoring Viewer grants read-only access to all Cloud Monitoring data including time-series metrics, dashboards, alert policies, and uptime checks. It does not grant access to resource configuration or logs.

Step 2: Locate Required IDs

Project ID

  1. Open the Google Cloud Console
  2. Click the project selector in the top navigation bar
  3. Your Project ID is shown next to the project name in the dropdown
  4. It is also visible in the URL: console.cloud.google.com/home/dashboard?project=<PROJECT_ID>

The Project ID is a lowercase alphanumeric string (e.g. my-project-123456). Do not confuse it with the Project Name or Project Number.

Step 3: Add Credentials to Crowswatch

Navigate to: Crowswatch → Add Service → Google Cloud

FieldValue
Project IDYour GCP Project ID
Service Account JSONThe contents of the downloaded JSON key file

Crowswatch extracts the required fields (client_email, private_key, etc.) from the JSON automatically.

Available Metrics

Compute Engine

  • CPU utilisation (%) per instance
  • Disk read/write throughput
  • Network ingress/egress (bytes)
  • Instance uptime

Cloud Run

  • Request count
  • Request latency (p50, p95, p99)
  • Error rate (%)
  • Container instance count (min, max, active)
  • Billable container instance time

Cloud CDN

  • Cache hit rate (%)
  • Total egress (GB)
  • Request volume
  • Backend request count

Cloud SQL

  • Database connections
  • CPU utilisation
  • Memory utilisation
  • Disk usage (bytes)

Alerting & Uptime

  • Active alert policy state
  • Uptime check success rate
  • Uptime check latency (ms)

Connect

  1. Enter your Project ID and paste the contents of your Service Account JSON key file
  2. Click Verify to confirm the credentials are valid
  3. Select the services and metrics you want to track
  4. Click Connect

Security

  • The Monitoring Viewer role is read-only. It cannot modify or delete any resources
  • Do not assign broader roles (e.g. Editor or Owner) to the service account
  • Each service account key is a sensitive credential. Store the JSON file securely and do not commit it to version control
  • Delete unused service account keys from the Google Cloud Console
  • Consider creating one service account per environment (staging, production)

Troubleshooting

Authentication error

Verify the JSON key file is complete and has not been modified. Confirm the service account still exists and is not disabled. Check that the JSON key has not been deleted from the Google Cloud Console.

Permission denied errors

Confirm the Monitoring Viewer role is assigned to the service account at the project level. The role must be on the correct project. Check the IAM page for the right project.

No metrics appearing

Ensure the Cloud Monitoring API is enabled for your project (APIs & Services → Enabled APIs). Some metrics only appear once the relevant Google Cloud service is active and receiving traffic.

Project ID not recognised

Use the Project ID (lowercase, alphanumeric), not the Project Name or the Project Number. The Project ID is shown in the JSON key file as project_id.