# Severities

Severities are customizable ways of alerting in case of an incident. They are the ideal way to create a pre-set way of alerting that could then be applied to multiple escalation policies.

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Severities can include any of the main alerting options:

* Call
* SMS
* E-mail
* Push notification
* Critical alert

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**Critical alert** is a mobile app notification that ignores mute switch and Do not Disturb mode.
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### Create a new severity

- Go to [Escalation policies -> Severities](https://uptime.betterstack.com/team/0/urgencies ";_blank").
- Click **Create severity**.
- Name your severity. See examples below.
- Select how you want to be alerted in case of an incident.
- Click **Save changes**.

Now you can use the severity in any of your [escalation policies](https://uptime.betterstack.com/team/0/policies  ";_blank").

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### 3 commonly used severities
- **High Severity** set to call, e-mail and critical alerts
- **Low Severity** set to e-mail and push notifications alerting
- **SMS only Severity** set to SMS alerting
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## Adjust personal alert settings

Want to customize your own notifications without changing the settings for everybody?

Customize how you'll be notified in [Settings → Alerts](https://betterstack.com/settings/push-notifications ";_blank").
Set how we should notify you when an incident with a particular severity occurs.

By default, you'll get notified as configured in [severities](https://uptime.betterstack.com/team/0/urgencies ";_blank") for your entire team.