Our Dragon release is finally landing, bringing with it a whole new set of powerful tools to xMatters instances! Inspired by the power and resilience of its legendary namesake, this release helps teams move faster, stay focused, and respond confidently when incidents occur. Let’s explore what’s new...

• Link incidents between xMatters and ServiceNow with ServiceNow Incident Sync, ensuring updates made in the xMatters Incident Console automatically appear in the related ServiceNow record so both systems stay aligned during an incident.
• Keep teams aligned across systems with Data Sync support for ServiceNow groups, automatically synchronizing groups and their members into xMatters to eliminate manual duplication and ensure the right people are included in notification and on-call workflows.
• Strengthen communication with custom domains for public status pages, enabling organizations to publish status updates under their own domain to increase trust and credibility during incidents.
• Organize teams more effectively with custom group properties, allowing administrators to define organization-specific metadata such as expertise or region so responders can quickly understand which groups should be engaged during an incident.

And so much more! Read on to learn more about what we've been working on...

Availability

Before you scroll down to see all the improvements included in this release, here are some important dates:

• Non-production environment access: Tuesday, March 24
• Production environment access: Tuesday, April 28 (enabled between 10:00-10:30am Pacific)

Though we aim to include as many features in each release as we can, it's possible that not everything in the release will be available at the same time. If that's the case for a specific feature, we'll include a note about availability in its write-up below.

Sneak peek

As a special bonus, we're also giving you a sneak peek at a feature we're working on for a future release:

• Custom group properties – Quickly view, sort, filter, and search groups using custom group properties to find and engage the right teams faster.

Incident response & service intelligence

The xMatters platform combines incident management capabilities with service intelligence to give teams the situational awareness they need to respond quickly and keep stakeholders informed. In this release, we're introducing ServiceNow incident synchronization, custom domains for public status pages, and several improvements to subscription management that make it easier to configure and maintain notifications.

ServiceNow Incident Sync

ServiceNow Incident Sync allows organizations using both xMatters and ServiceNow to link incidents between the two systems so they stay aligned throughout the resolution process. When configured through a Flow Designer step, updates made in the xMatters Incident Console (such as changes to the incident summary, description, status, severity, or timeline) are automatically synchronized with the related ServiceNow incident.

This makes it easier for organizations to keep ServiceNow as their official system of record while using the xMatters Incident Console for faster incident response. For example, an operations team can manage the incident in xMatters while updates automatically appear in the linked ServiceNow record, ensuring stakeholders and auditors always have an accurate view of the incident as it evolves.

Custom domains for public status pages

Availability: Non-production & EAP on March 31; production access with Dragon release (April 28).

Incident managers can now publish public status pages using a domain owned by their organization, such as 'status.<company>.com'. Using a company-owned domain helps increase trust and credibility during incidents and outages by presenting status information under a familiar address. For example, a SaaS provider can share https://status.company.com during a service disruption so customers immediately recognize the domain and follow updates without confusion.

When you configure the domain during setup, the system provides instructions to easily connect it. Once the connection is verified, the status page becomes accessible through the organization’s domain while existing links to the status page continue to work.

Manage subscriptions: updated add and edit process

The 'Add' and 'Edit' Subscription pages in the new Subscriptions interface have been updated to better align with the current user interface while continuing to support the same subscription capabilities. The updated pages provide a clearer and more consistent experience for defining when notifications should be triggered and who should receive them, helping admins and supervisors configure subscriptions more quickly and with greater confidence. For example, an administrator can create a subscription that notifies a support team when a specific operational event occurs, define the conditions that trigger the notification, select the recipients and device types, and activate the subscription so the appropriate team members are alerted whenever those conditions occur.

Manage subscriptions: created date column

To make it easier to understand and manage subscriptions, the Subscriptions page now includes a new 'Date Created' column and 'Created' filter. This lets you quickly see when a subscription was created, show the newest subscriptions at the top of the list, or filter by a specific age range, making it easier to review and manage subscriptions created by you or other xMatters users.

Manage subscriptions: update subscribers from details page

Authorized users can now update the list of subscribers directly from the Subscription's details page without editing the entire subscription. This makes it easier for administrators and supervisors to quickly adjust who receives subscription notifications as teams change, shifts rotate, or responsibilities move between groups, while reducing the risk of unintentionally modifying other subscription settings.

Automation & integrations

Strong integrations help teams automate workflows, reduce manual work, and keep systems better aligned during incidents. In this release, we're introducing OAuth 2.0 client credentials support, new automation steps and triggers, expanded integrations with Freshservice and ServiceNow, and more.

OAuth 2.0 client credentials support

Flow Designer now supports OAuth 2.0 Client Credentials authentication through two new endpoint options: OAuth 2.0 (Client Credentials) and ServiceNow – OAuth 2.0 (Client Credentials). These options allow Flow Designer to authenticate with external services using a client ID and client secret to obtain an access token and securely call APIs as the application rather than a specific user. You can build secure, application-to-application integrations that align with modern security practices, avoid reliance on user credentials, and run fully automated workflows with platforms such as Microsoft Graph API and ServiceNow.

Trigger view filters

Trigger view filters allow users to quickly narrow down the list of triggers in xMatters using flexible, combinable filters. Instead of scrolling through long trigger lists, you can filter results by workflow, status, type (such as Email, HTTP, or Schedule), or permissions, making it easier to surface only the triggers that match specific criteria.

This helps teams locate and manage triggers more efficiently, especially in environments with large or complex workflows. For example, an operations engineer troubleshooting an alert-processing workflow can filter the trigger list by 'Workflow: Alert Processing' and 'Type: HTTP' to quickly identify the trigger responsible for receiving incoming alerts.

Get User Device step

The Get User Device step in Flow Designer allows flows to retrieve details about a specific device associated with an xMatters user. Using the user’s target name and a device name (such as 'Work Email'), the step returns information including the target name, device type, status, and contact details like an email address or phone number. This allows flows to dynamically access contact information configured on a user’s device and use it in downstream steps, integrations, or API calls. By retrieving device information directly from a user’s configuration, flows no longer need to duplicate or maintain contact details in multiple places, helping to reduce configuration overhead and ensuring integrations always use the most up-to-date information.

xMatters Agent upgraded to Java 21

The xMatters Agent runtime has been upgraded to Java 21, a long-term support (LTS) release of the Java platform. The agent continues to operate the same way when handling integrations, running workflows, and communicating with the xMatters platform, but now runs on a more modern and supported Java runtime. This update helps ensure the agent remains secure, supported, and aligned with modern infrastructure standards. By moving to Java 21, organizations benefit from ongoing security updates, improved performance and stability, and long-term support from the Java ecosystem while continuing to run their existing integrations and automation. 

BMC Control-M job status trigger

Flow Designer now includes a trigger that lets xMatters flows be initiated by BMC Control-M job status events. A lightweight plugin installed in the Control-M environment calls the xMatters trigger as part of the job workflow. This provides real-time visibility and response to Control-M job events, enabling teams to notify stakeholders, start incident response, or run remediation steps automatically when job status changes. 

When a job starts, completes, or fails, the plugin sends the job status signal to the Flow Designer trigger, which receives the job data and starts the associated xMatters flow so automated actions can run.

Freshservice trigger and steps

Flow Designer now includes native integration with Freshservice that allows workflows to react to ticket events and perform ticket actions directly. The integration introduces a Freshservice Alerts trigger that starts a flow when a ticket is created or updated, along with steps to 'Create Ticket', 'Update Ticket', and 'Add Note to Ticket' so flows can manage ticket activity from automation.

For example, when a high priority ticket is created in Freshservice for a production outage, the trigger can start an xMatters flow that notifies the on call engineer and posts ticket details to a collaboration channel. As work progresses, the flow can add notes to the Freshservice ticket and update its status when the issue is resolved, helping ensure the service desk and response teams stay aligned without manual updates.

Data Sync support for ServiceNow groups

To reduce the need to manually recreate group structures and manage membership across both platforms, the xMatters Data Sync now includes support for synchronizing ServiceNow groups and their members into xMatters. Administrators can configure the sync by mapping ServiceNow roles to xMatters group types. When a ServiceNow group is assigned one of the mapped roles, it becomes eligible for synchronization and is created in xMatters with its mapped attributes (such as name, description, site, and other properties). Group members are also synchronized, adding ServiceNow group members to the corresponding xMatters group roster if they already exist in xMatters or are created through the user synchronization process.

On-call management & user experience

Clear visibility into teams and responsibilities helps responders find the right people quickly during incidents. In this release, we're introducing custom group properties so organizations can define their own metadata for groups, along with a sneak peek of upcoming enhancements that will make it easier to discover and locate groups using those properties, and adding more organizational options for workflows and messaging forms.

Custom group properties

Custom group properties allow organizations to define their own metadata fields that can be applied to groups across xMatters. This helps organizations describe and organize groups using attributes that reflect how their teams operate.

Company administrators can easily create and manage these properties from a new Custom Group Properties page in the Admin menu. Each property can use a specific data type such as text, number, checkbox, list, or multi-select list, and administrators can define validation rules or mark properties as required. Once created, group administrators can populate these values when adding or editing groups, and selected properties appear on the group overview page.

For example, a company might define custom properties such as expertise, region, or when their last certification date was. When group administrators fill in these fields, users viewing the group overview page can quickly see key information about the group’s responsibilities and coverage, making it easier to determine which group should be engaged during an incident.

Sneak Peek: Custom group properties

For our Elemental release, users will be able to use custom group properties to find and manage groups quickly and easily. On the Groups list page, users will be able to view, sort, filter, and search the list using these properties. For example, if an administrator defines a property called 'Region', a user can filter the list where 'Region' = 'West' to quickly locate and engage with the appropriate groups.

Workflows list page updates

Availability note: To ensure a smooth and reliable user experience, this feature has been postponed to our Elemental release as we continue to refine functionality.

To help users locate and manage large numbers of workflows more quickly, the Workflows list page has been refreshed with a new layout and additional ways to organize and access workflows more efficiently. Users can now star workflows they use frequently and filter the list to show only their starred items, creating a personalized view that highlights the workflows most relevant to them without affecting other users. The page also includes new options to sort workflows by name (A–Z or Z–A) and to filter by enabled status or edit permissions.

Messaging page updates

Availability note: To ensure a smooth and reliable user experience, this feature has been postponed to our Elemental release as we continue to refine functionality.

During time-sensitive situations or critical events, organizations need to prioritize the workflows that matter most. The Messaging page now allows users with the appropriate permissions to manually adjust the order of workflow groupings. Administrators can rearrange how groups of workflow forms appear so that the workflows used most often are easier to find. Once updated, the new ordering becomes the default view for all users accessing the Messaging page.

Reporting & analytics

Reporting in xMatters helps teams understand system activity and maintain visibility into operational changes. In this release, we’re adding new audit and reporting capabilities that improve transparency and troubleshooting, including audit tracking for shift and supervisor configuration changes and expanded visibility into alerts generated by workflows users can edit.

Shift and person supervisor audit reporting

Availability: Production release

To improve visibility and accountability for changes that affect on-call coverage and escalation paths, changes made to shift configurations and person supervisor assignments are now recorded in the System Audit Report. Each entry captures who made the change, what was changed, and when it occurred. Administrators can review these records to track configuration updates and maintain a clear audit trail.

For example, if a shift stops notifying the correct responder, an administrator can check the System Audit Report to see whether the shift configuration or supervisor assignment was recently modified, including who made the change and when it occurred.

View alerts sent via workflows a user can edit in the Alerts report

Users can now view alerts generated by workflows they already have editor permissions for directly in the Alerts report. When this permission is enabled, users gain visibility into alerts triggered by those workflows without needing additional alert-specific permissions. This mirrors the existing behavior that allows users to view alerts sent from forms they have sender access to and helps the people responsible for maintaining alerting workflows verify and troubleshoot automated notifications more easily. For example, an operations engineer who edits a workflow that sends alerts during outages can review the Alerts report to confirm that the alerts were triggered and delivered as expected, so issues can be identified more quickly if notifications behave unexpectedly.

Mobile updates

The xMatters mobile apps help resolvers stay connected and take action wherever they are. In this release, we’re improving how users interact with incidents on mobile devices with enhancements to alert responses, direct linking to the Incident Console in the mobile app, and a new banner that makes it easier for users to discover and launch the xMatters mobile app.

Respond to an alert: user experience improvements

Availability: Mid-May

For Dragon, we've enhanced the experience for responding to alerts across both email and the xMatters mobile app to give responders more flexibility when handling alerts from their mobile devices. When responding via email on a mobile device, the browser page now adapts to the width of the screen, with messages, input fields, and buttons centered and easier to read and interact with. In the xMatters iOS and Android mobile apps, users can now add comments, join conference calls, or open associated links at any time after responding, rather than only during the initial response.

Universal linking (iOS) and app links (Android) for Incident Console

Incident links opened on a mobile device will now launch directly in the xMatters mobile app instead of opening in a mobile browser. When a user taps an incident link from sources such as email, Slack, or a document, the link redirects them to the Incident Console in the xMatters mobile app so they can view incident details in an experience optimized for mobile. From the Incident Console, users can then open the options menu to copy the incident link and share it with others or choose to open the incident in a mobile browser if they need access to features not currently supported in the mobile app.

Mobile app banner

Users who open 'xmatters.com' from a mobile browser such as Safari or Chrome will now see a banner at the top of the page highlighting the availability of the xMatters mobile app. Tapping 'Open' takes the user to the App Store or Google Play Store where they can download and install the app if it is not already installed. On supported devices where the app is already installed, the banner can also launch the xMatters mobile app directly.

Early Access Program & feature delivery update

The goal of our current delivery model is to balance feature delivery with customer change management processes. This means providing visibility into upcoming changes for customers that want it, while allowing other customers to have a more standard non-production environment that matches production.

If you aren't familiar with the current model, we release features only visible to admins/developers at a faster pace than the quarterly release process. These features should not impact end users until a customer provisions them into their workflow. Customers can opt their non-production environments into the Early Access Program to see features and functionality enhancements that impact end users before they're released on a quarterly basis. All customer non-production environments are updated four weeks prior to an official quarterly production release to allow for testing and training on new features.

We regularly reevaluate and improve our deployment processes to ensure they reflect industry best practices and customer feedback. For more information about our deployment process, see our xMatters Deployment and Early Access article. We'll update that document whenever we make a change, and let you know about the change through other appropriate channels.

Learn more

These are the main features for this release but, as always, there are several other small changes and enhancements we're delivering to keep xMatters forging ahead. As always, detailed information and instructions for using these new features will be available in our online documentation.

We hope you enjoy everything we've packed into the Dragon release, and we're looking forward to seeing you again soon for Elemental...

The information in this article is the intellectual property of xMatters, an Everbridge Company, and is intended only for use with xMatters products by xMatters customers and their employees. Further, this intellectual property is proprietary and must not be reused or resold.