# Acknowledge timeout

## What is acknowledge timeout?

After acknowledging the incident, if it is not resolved in given amount of time then it will return to **triggered state**. Escalations and alerts will resume again.

Many-a-times, you or your team-mate would acknowledge an incident but never get around to resolving it for multitude of reasons. This is where the **acknowledge timeout** feature comes in handy.

You can set acknowledge timeout **in minutes** to all of your new and existing integrations by editing a service or adding a new service.

![Acknowledge timeout](https://1743514643-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-x-prod.appspot.com/o/spaces%2F-Ln3jS1bJTTsE3yoEcOu%2Fuploads%2Fgit-blob-fca4499708a85f1e3773a510d92657dc12c28f34%2Fack-timeout.png?alt=media\&token=23f438e1-99d1-46d7-a4c9-7c4824bc1384)

### What is an ideal Acknowledge timeout?

This really depends on the integration. The more critical it is the shorter the timeout should be.

*Here's what we recommend -*

1. Critical integration - **20 minutes**
2. Severe but not critical integration - **60 minutes**
3. Non-severe and non-critical integration - **Leave it blank.**

You don't need an Acknowledge timeout for *every integration.*

{% hint style="info" %}
Please make sure to keep a generous timeout and **avoid keeping short times like 5 or 10 minutes**. Keeping short timeouts will end up in way too many alerts you did rather ignore.
{% endhint %}