glances
Glances is a cross-platform system monitoring tool written in Python that provides a comprehensive overview of your system in a single terminal window. Unlike traditional monitors that focus on one metric, Glances shows CPU, memory, disk, network, processes, containers, and sensors all at once, with an auto-refreshing interface that adapts to your terminal size. It can run in standalone mode, as a web server, or as a REST API for remote monitoring.
Key Features
- Unified dashboard — CPU, memory, disk, network, processes, sensors, and containers on one screen
- Web interface — Built-in web server mode accessible from any browser
- REST API — JSON API for integration with monitoring stacks (Prometheus, Grafana)
- Docker support — Container-aware monitoring showing per-container resource usage
- Alert system — Configurable thresholds with visual warnings and logging
- Export modules — Send metrics to CSV, InfluxDB, Prometheus, RabbitMQ, and more
- Plugin system — Extensible through Python plugins for custom monitoring
- Remote monitoring — Client-server mode for monitoring multiple machines
Why Use It
Glances provides the broadest coverage of any TUI monitor — it shows everything in one place rather than requiring separate tools for CPU, memory, and network. The web interface makes it useful for headless servers where you cannot run a TUI directly.
Use Cases
- Quick server health check — Single command to assess all system resources
- Remote monitoring — Run Glances in server mode on remote machines and connect from a client
- Container host monitoring — Track Docker container resource usage alongside host metrics
- Alert-based monitoring — Set CPU/memory thresholds and get notified when exceeded
Platform
Linux, macOS, Windows, BSD — Python 3.6+ required
Licence
GNU Lesser General Public License v3.0