> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://beads.gascity.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# bd heartbeat

> Refresh the lease on an issue you hold in_progress

Generated from `bd help --doc heartbeat`.

Refresh the lease on an issue you currently hold in\_progress.

A claim carries a lease that expires after a TTL. A worker keeps its claim alive
by heartbeating faster than the TTL; once it stops (because it died), the lease
goes stale and 'bd reclaim' reverts the issue to ready so another worker can pick
it up. Heartbeat pushes lease\_expires\_at forward and stamps heartbeat\_at = now.

Only the current owner may heartbeat. If the lease has already been reclaimed or
the issue closed, heartbeat fails so the worker learns to stop.

Heartbeat writes a Dolt commit, so heartbeat well below the TTL but not so fast
it bloats history — cadence should be a small fraction of the TTL, not per-op.

Examples:
bd heartbeat bd-123
bd hb bd-123

```
bd heartbeat <id> [flags]
```

**Aliases:** hb