SLO & Reliability Practical By Samson Tanimawo, PhD Published Feb 11, 2026 4 min read

Burn Rate Formula

Burn rate = errors / budget × time-window.

Calculate

Per service: actual error rate / acceptable error rate.

Burn rate >1 = exhausting.

Alert

Burn rate >14x for 1h: page.

Catches sustained drift fast.

Multi-window

Different windows; different thresholds.

Catches both spikes and drift.