Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide techniques for identifying measurement occasions (MOs) to monitor and refrain from monitoring for a repetition of a downlink channel. An example method generally includes determining that, within a monitoring occasion (MO) duration associated with decoding a number of physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) repetitions, the UE should refrain from monitoring at least one MO associated with a first control resource set (CORESET), wherein the MO duration comprises multiple MOs in which the UE is to monitor for repeated PDCCH candidates; refraining from monitoring a first subset of MOs in the MO duration, based on the determination; and monitoring a second subset of MOs within the MO duration.