Configure Severity and Priority Labels

Learn how to configure severity and priority labels for your organization

Configure severity levels for incidents and priority levels for alerts to match your organization's terminology and classification system.

Overview

By default, Harness AI SRE uses standard severity and priority labels. You can configure these labels organization-wide to:

• Match your existing incident management terminology

• Provide clearer context for your team

• Align with your organization's severity classification standards

• Improve consistency across incident response workflows

Important: Custom labels only change the display text. The underlying severity/priority values remain the same, ensuring compatibility with integrations, APIs, and historical data.

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Access custom options

To open the severity and priority configuration:

1. Navigate to Organization Settings

2. Under Settings mainly used in AI SRE, click Severities & Statuses for AI SRE

3. Use the tabs to configure:

   • Incidents tab - Configure severity levels

   • Alerts tab - Configure priority levels

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Configure incident severity levels

Default severity labels

Level	ID	Default Label	Description
SEV0	"0"	SEV0: Critical	Highest severity
SEV1	"1"	SEV1: Major	High severity
SEV2	"2"	SEV2: Moderate	Moderate severity
SEV3	"3"	SEV3: Minor	Low severity
SEV4	"4"	SEV4: Cosmetic	Lowest severity

Configure severity labels

To configure severity labels:

1. Go to Organization Settings → Severities & Statuses for AI SRE

2. Select the Incidents tab

3. Click the Edit icon next to any severity level

4. Update the:

   • Label - The display name (max 20 characters)

   • Description - Additional context for your team

5. Click Save

Example customizations:

• Change "SEV0: Critical" to "P0: Business Critical"

• Change "SEV1: Major" to "P1: Production Down"

• Change "SEV2: Moderate" to "P2: Degraded Service"

Use custom severity in workflows

Custom labels appear throughout AI SRE:

• Incident cards and detail pages

• Filters and search

• Status updates

• Reports and analytics

• Slack notifications

• Email notifications

API and integration usage: When using the API or configuring runbook triggers, always use the original ID values ("0", "1", "2", "3", "4"), not the custom labels.

# Runbook trigger example <a href="#runbook-trigger-example" id="runbook-trigger-example"></a>
trigger:
  condition:
    field: severity
    operator: equals
    value: "0"  # Use ID, not custom label

Go to Incident fields to understand how to use severity values in integrations.

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Configure alert priority levels

Default priority labels

Level	ID	Default Label	Description
P1	p1_critical	P1: Critical	Critical priority
P2	p2_error	P2: Error	High priority
P3	p3_warning	P3: Warning	Medium priority
P4	p4_info	P4: Info	Low priority

Configure priority labels

To configure priority labels:

1. Go to Organization Settings → Severities & Statuses for AI SRE

2. Select the Alerts tab

3. Click the Edit icon next to any priority level

4. Update the:

   • Label - The display name (max 20 characters)

   • Description - Additional context for your team

5. Click Save

Example customizations:

• Change "P1: Critical" to "Urgent"

• Change "P2: Error" to "High"

• Change "P3: Warning" to "Medium"

• Change "P4: Info" to "Low"

Use custom priority in workflows

Custom labels appear throughout AI SRE:

• Alert cards and detail pages

• Alert rules

• Filters and search

• Reports and analytics

• Slack notifications

• Email notifications

API and integration usage: When using the API or configuring route alerts, always use the original ID values (p1_critical, p2_error, p3_warning, p4_info), not the custom labels.

# Alert rule example <a href="#alert-rule-example" id="alert-rule-example"></a>
alert_rule:
  condition:
    priority: p1_critical  # Use ID, not custom label
  action:
    create_incident: true

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Best practices

Label design

• Keep labels concise: Maximum 20 characters

• Use consistent naming: Follow a standard pattern (e.g., "P0: Business Critical", "P1: Production Down")

• Avoid abbreviations: Unless universally understood in your organization

• Include severity level: Help users understand the hierarchy at a glance

Descriptions

• Add context: Explain when to use each severity/priority level

• Define impact: Describe the typical impact for each level

• Provide examples: Include example scenarios

• Update regularly: Keep descriptions current as processes evolve

Team alignment

• Document changes: Announce custom labels to your team

• Train responders: Ensure everyone understands the new terminology

• Update runbooks: Reference custom labels in response procedures

• Gather feedback: Periodically review effectiveness with your team

API and integration considerations

• Test integrations: Verify external systems work with custom labels

• Document mappings: Create a reference showing ID to label mappings

• Update documentation: Update internal runbooks and procedures

• Monitor for issues: Check that custom labels do not break workflows

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Important notes

What changes

• Display labels throughout the UI

• Labels in notifications (Slack, email)

• Labels in exports and reports

• Labels in search and filters

What does not change

• Underlying ID values

• API request/response formats

• Integration mappings

• Historical data

• Database storage format

Organization-wide impact

Custom severity and priority labels apply to:

• All projects in the organization

• All teams and users

• All incidents and alerts (past and future)

• All integrations and workflows

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Troubleshooting

Custom severity or priority labels not appearing in AI SRE

Refresh the page after saving, clear the browser cache or use a private window, and verify you have organization admin permissions.

Integrations sending incorrect severity values in Harness AI SRE

Integrations send original severity ID values, not custom labels. Custom labels are applied on display only. Check integration mappings in the Incident fields reference.

API requests failing when using custom severity or priority labels in AI SRE

Always use ID values in API calls, never custom labels. Review the correct ID values in the Incident fields reference.

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Example configurations

Enterprise standard

SEV0 → "P0: Business Critical"
SEV1 → "P1: Major Incident"  
SEV2 → "P2: Significant Issue"
SEV3 → "P3: Minor Issue"
SEV4 → "P4: Informational"

SRE team

SEV0 → "Critical: All hands"
SEV1 → "High: Oncall + Manager"
SEV2 → "Medium: Oncall"
SEV3 → "Low: Best effort"
SEV4 → "Info: Track only"

Customer impact based

SEV0 → "Total Outage"
SEV1 → "Major Degradation"
SEV2 → "Partial Impact"
SEV3 → "Minimal Impact"
SEV4 → "No Customer Impact"

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Next steps

Documentation

• Configure incident fields: Customize fields captured on incidents.

• Incident types: Standardize incident classification.

• Route alerts: Route alerts to incidents.

Related topics

• Incident workflows: Automate incident response.

• Status updates: Communicate with stakeholders.