diff --git a/doc/admin/observability/alerts.md b/doc/admin/observability/alerts.md
index 6c4173a605d..4f9d832ad02 100644
--- a/doc/admin/observability/alerts.md
+++ b/doc/admin/observability/alerts.md
@@ -2221,7 +2221,7 @@ Generated query for critical alert: `min((sum by (app) (up{app=~".*(pgsql|codein
 
 **Descriptions**
 
-- <span class="badge badge-critical">critical</span> precise-code-intel-worker: 18000s+ unprocessed upload record queue longest time in queue
+- <span class="badge badge-warning">warning</span> precise-code-intel-worker: 18000s+ unprocessed upload record queue longest time in queue
 
 **Next steps**
 
@@ -2233,7 +2233,7 @@ count being required for the volume of uploads.
 
 ```json
 "observability.silenceAlerts": [
-  "critical_precise-code-intel-worker_codeintel_upload_queued_max_age"
+  "warning_precise-code-intel-worker_codeintel_upload_queued_max_age"
 ]
 ```
 
@@ -2242,7 +2242,7 @@ count being required for the volume of uploads.
 <details>
 <summary>Technical details</summary>
 
-Generated query for critical alert: `max((max(src_codeintel_upload_queued_duration_seconds_total{job=~"^precise-code-intel-worker.*"})) >= 18000)`
+Generated query for warning alert: `max((max(src_codeintel_upload_queued_duration_seconds_total{job=~"^precise-code-intel-worker.*"})) >= 18000)`
 
 </details>
 
diff --git a/monitoring/definitions/shared/codeintel.go b/monitoring/definitions/shared/codeintel.go
index 9649c09abee..b1e3ab3c7e2 100644
--- a/monitoring/definitions/shared/codeintel.go
+++ b/monitoring/definitions/shared/codeintel.go
@@ -66,7 +66,7 @@ func (codeIntelligence) NewUploadQueueGroup(containerName string) monitoring.Gro
 		},
 
 		QueueSize: NoAlertsOption("none"),
-		QueueMaxAge: CriticalOption(monitoring.Alert().GreaterOrEqual((time.Hour * 5).Seconds()), `
+		QueueMaxAge: WarningOption(monitoring.Alert().GreaterOrEqual((time.Hour * 5).Seconds()), `
 			An alert here could be indicative of a few things: an upload surfacing a pathological performance characteristic,
 			precise-code-intel-worker being underprovisioned for the required upload processing throughput, or a higher replica
 			count being required for the volume of uploads.