Incident priority levels (P0 through P4) quantify the business and operational urgency of an incident, dictating paging rules, escalation paths, and target response/resolution times (SLAs/SLOs).
| Priority | Severity / Impact | Scope & Characteristics | Target Response (Acknowledge) | Target Resolution / Mitigation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| P0 (Catastrophic) | Critical core system outage; catastrophic revenue, data integrity, or compliance impact. | Complete loss of core business functionality affecting all or a critical majority of users; data corruption or critical security breach; zero workaround. | Immediate (< 5–15 min) | Continuous 24/7 war room until mitigated (< 1–2 hours) |
| P1 (Critical) | High-impact degradation; critical business process blocked with no easy workaround. | Major service failure affecting a significant subset of users, key enterprise customers, or critical workflows (e.g., checkout broken, core API failing). | < 15–30 min | Active continuous work until mitigated |