---
title: "POST /DescribeAlert"
method: POST
path: "/DescribeAlert"
---

# POST /DescribeAlert

`POST /DescribeAlert`

Describes an alert.

Amazon Lookout for Metrics API actions are eventually consistent. If you do a read operation on a resource immediately after creating or modifying it, use retries to allow time for the write operation to complete.

## Request body

- object
  - `AlertArn` string, required — The ARN of the alert to describe.

## Response `200`

Success

- DescribeAlertResponse
  - `Alert` object — Contains information about an alert.
    - `Action` object — Action that will be triggered when there is an alert.
      - `SNSConfiguration` object — A configuration for an Amazon SNS channel.
        - `RoleArn` string, required — The ARN of the IAM role that has access to the target SNS topic.
        - `SnsTopicArn` string, required — The ARN of the target SNS topic.
        - `SnsFormat` 'LONG_TEXT' | 'SHORT_TEXT' | 'JSON' — <p>The format of the SNS topic.</p> <ul> <li> <p> <code>JSON</code> – Send JSON alerts with an anomaly ID and a link to the anomaly detail page. This is the default.</p> </li> <li> <p> <code>LONG_TEXT</code> – Send human-readable alerts with information about the impacted timeseries and a link to the anomaly detail page. We recommend this for email.</p> </li> <li> <p> <code>SHORT_TEXT</code> – Send human-readable alerts with a link to the anomaly detail page. We recommend this for SMS.</p> </li> </ul>
      - `LambdaConfiguration` object — A configuration for an AWS Lambda channel.
        - `RoleArn` string, required — The ARN of an IAM role that has permission to invoke the Lambda function.
        - `LambdaArn` string, required — The ARN of the Lambda function.
    - `AlertDescription` string — A description of the alert.
    - `AlertArn` string — The ARN of the alert.
    - `AnomalyDetectorArn` string — The ARN of the detector to which the alert is attached.
    - `AlertName` string — The name of the alert.
    - `AlertSensitivityThreshold` integer — The minimum severity for an anomaly to trigger the alert.
    - `AlertType` 'SNS' | 'LAMBDA' — The type of the alert.
    - `AlertStatus` 'ACTIVE' | 'INACTIVE' — The status of the alert.
    - `LastModificationTime` string, date-time — The time at which the alert was last modified.
    - `CreationTime` string, date-time — The time at which the alert was created.
    - `AlertFilters` object — The configuration of the alert filters, containing MetricList and DimensionFilter.
      - `MetricList` MetricName[] — The list of measures that you want to get alerts for.
      - `DimensionFilterList` DimensionFilter[] — The list of DimensionFilter objects that are used for dimension-based filtering.
        - `DimensionName` string — The name of the dimension to filter on.
        - `DimensionValueList` DimensionValue[] — The list of values for the dimension specified in DimensionName that you want to filter on.

## Other responses

- `480` — ResourceNotFoundException
- `481` — ValidationException
- `482` — AccessDeniedException
- `483` — InternalServerException
- `484` — TooManyRequestsException

---

[API](https://skmtc.net/aws/apis/lookoutmetrics.md) · [All operations](https://skmtc.net/aws/apis/lookoutmetrics/llms.txt) · [OpenAPI document](https://skmtc-service-staging.skmtc.workers.dev/v1/apis/aws/lookoutmetrics/versions/aace1e573660/schema)