diff --git a/ui/src/pages/Alerts/RuleEditor/condition-forms/RouteMetricForm.tsx b/ui/src/pages/Alerts/RuleEditor/condition-forms/RouteMetricForm.tsx
index e8138110..40287172 100644
--- a/ui/src/pages/Alerts/RuleEditor/condition-forms/RouteMetricForm.tsx
+++ b/ui/src/pages/Alerts/RuleEditor/condition-forms/RouteMetricForm.tsx
@@ -1,9 +1,9 @@
 import { FormField, Input, Select } from '@cameleer/design-system';
 import type { FormState } from '../form-state';
 
+// Mirrors cameleer-server-core RouteMetric enum — keep in sync.
 const METRICS = [
   { value: 'ERROR_RATE', label: 'Error rate' },
-  { value: 'P95_LATENCY_MS', label: 'P95 latency (ms)' },
   { value: 'P99_LATENCY_MS', label: 'P99 latency (ms)' },
   { value: 'AVG_DURATION_MS', label: 'Avg duration (ms)' },
   { value: 'THROUGHPUT', label: 'Throughput (msg/s)' },
diff --git a/ui/src/pages/Alerts/RuleEditor/form-state.ts b/ui/src/pages/Alerts/RuleEditor/form-state.ts
index e6cee874..72385302 100644
--- a/ui/src/pages/Alerts/RuleEditor/form-state.ts
+++ b/ui/src/pages/Alerts/RuleEditor/form-state.ts
@@ -51,7 +51,17 @@ export function initialForm(existing?: AlertRuleResponse): FormState {
       routeId: '',
       agentId: '',
       conditionKind: 'ROUTE_METRIC',
-      condition: { kind: 'ROUTE_METRIC' } as Partial<AlertCondition>,
+      // Pre-populate a valid ROUTE_METRIC default so a rule can be saved without
+      // the user needing to fill in every condition field. Values chosen to be
+      // sane for "error rate" alerts on almost any route.
+      condition: {
+        kind: 'ROUTE_METRIC',
+        scope: {},
+        metric: 'ERROR_RATE',
+        comparator: 'GT',
+        threshold: 0.05,
+        windowSeconds: 300,
+      } as unknown as Partial<AlertCondition>,
       evaluationIntervalSeconds: 60,
       forDurationSeconds: 0,
       reNotifyMinutes: 60,