NetWatch

Network diagnostics in your terminal.

netwatch --view dense. Four boxes, no chrome, every keybind on a border. Download grows up from the axis, upload grows down.

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One binary, no config. netwatch with capture permissions gives you live capture with L7 decode, process attribution where available, and a diagnostic engine that opens an issue when a learned baseline breaks and closes it when the fix holds.

Install

brew install netwatch                 # macOS / Linux
scoop install netwatch                # Windows (needs Npcap)
cargo binstall netwatch-tui           # prebuilt binary (needs cargo-binstall)
cargo install netwatch-tui            # build from source, anywhere with Rust
paru -S netwatch-tui                  # Arch (AUR)
nix-shell -p netwatch                 # NixOS / Nix
conda install -c conda-forge netwatch # conda / mamba (Linux, macOS)

Debian / Ubuntu (apt repository):

curl -fsSL https://matthart1983.github.io/netwatch/apt/netwatch.gpg \
  | sudo tee /usr/share/keyrings/netwatch.gpg >/dev/null
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/netwatch.gpg] \
https://matthart1983.github.io/netwatch/apt stable main" \
  | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/netwatch.list
sudo apt update && sudo apt install netwatch

Fedora: sudo dnf copr enable matthart1983/netwatch && sudo dnf install netwatch

Container: docker run --rm -it --net=host --pid=host --cap-add=NET_RAW ghcr.io/matthart1983/netwatch

Binaries for macOS, Linux (x86_64, aarch64, armv5te), FreeBSD (x86_64) and Windows are on the releases page, with .deb, .rpm, checksums and signed provenance. The Linux builds are static and need nothing installed; Windows needs Npcap.

FreeBSD is best-effort. netwatch-freebsd-x86_64 is built on FreeBSD 13.5 and dynamically links the base system's libc and libpcap, so it needs FreeBSD 13 or newer (it cannot be static). On anything older, build from source with cargo install netwatch-tui. Verifying a download · every channel.

Run

Packet capture needs elevated access. On Linux, grant cap_net_raw,cap_bpf,cap_perfmon+eip to a binary restricted to a netwatch group, or run the systemd unit. sudo netwatch works, but as root the sandbox is defence in depth only and containment is limited. See the threat model.

netwatch              # interfaces, connections, config. No privileges.
sudo netwatch         # works; root containment is limited
netwatch --lite       # one 80x24 screen
netwatch --view dense # four boxes, 130x44 or larger

1 to 9 and 0 switch tabs, V cycles the three views, ? shows every key.

Without the TUI

netwatch doctor                          # what netwatch can see on this host, and why not
netwatch diagnose run --budget 30s       # one bounded diagnosis; exit 0 clean, 1 issue, 2 no evidence
netwatch diagnose run --format json      # the same, for scripts
netwatch daemon --metrics                # headless; Prometheus /metrics on 127.0.0.1:9464
netwatch uptime --since 7d               # outages this week: when, how long, and which hop failed
netwatch geoip update                    # download the offline GeoIP databases
netwatch --demo                          # replay a recorded Diagnose incident, no capture needed

daemon runs the same collectors with no screen; a systemd unit and a launchd agent ship with it, and Prometheus export lists the metrics. --remote URL with NETWATCH_API_KEY streams snapshots to a backend you run. Both stay accepted through 1.x, and what they do is experimental: the wire format may change. So are AI Insights, netwatch resolver set and recover, and the JSON in PCAPNG packet comments: what that covers. Every command and flag.

The tabs

#	Tab	Shows
1	Dashboard	Latency tiles, mirrored throughput, the link carrying it, connections rolled up per process
2	Connections	Every socket with process, PID, state, GeoIP, RTT, retransmits
3	Interfaces	Addresses, MTU, rates, errors, drops
4	Packets	Live decode, TLS 1.3 decryption, JA4, stream tracking, display filters, PCAPNG and PCAP export
5	Stats	Protocol breakdown and handshake-timing histogram
6	Topology	Machine, gateway, DNS, top hosts, traceroute, how long the connection has been up
7	Timeline	Connections by TCP state, with alerts
8	Processes	Bandwidth per process
9	Diagnose	Issue, cause, fix, verified close. report.md from the same objects
0	Egress	Learned destinations, promoted policy, drift

Every keybinding, display filters, decoders, themes, configuration.

Views

V cycles all three without a restart; the collectors keep running.

View	Size	For
Full	any	The ten tabs above
Lite (--lite)	80x24	An SSH session to a Pi, or a tmux split
Dense (--view dense)	130x44+	The hero image: four boxes, braille throughput, kernel TCP detail

Why they look like this.

Docs

Reference	Keys, filters, decoders, configuration, permissions
Stability	What 1.0 promises, and what stays experimental
Diagnose	Baselines, the 30 rules, ranked causes, verified closes
TLS decryption	Point SSLKEYLOGFILE at netwatch and read your own traffic
Egress linting	Observe destinations, promote a policy, alert on what you block
Security and forensics	Beaconing, scans, DNS tunnelling, JA4, the flight recorder
Capability matrix	Platform differences, diagnostic limits and verification scope
Attribution evidence	Identity, freshness, coverage denominators and controlled results
Doctor command	Read-only setup report, JSON capabilities and optional capture check
Design 0.30	Why the screens look the way they do
Architecture	Runtime, source map, permissions model, how to build and verify
AI Insights	Optional LLM commentary inside Diagnose, off by default. Experimental
Prometheus export	Exposed metrics and scrape config
Packaging	Every channel, and what updates it
Changelog	Every release

Diagnose misread your network? Open an issue with what you saw and the output of netwatch diagnose run --format json. It names your gateway and resolver addresses, so edit those out if you'd rather.

Related

SysWatch and DiskWatch share the chrome. ESSH is a Rust SSH client with the same look. NetWatch Cloud is hosted fleet monitoring built on the MIT agent, SDK and dashboard.

Thanks

Much of the packaging is other people's work. Dominiquini and kemelzaidan maintain netwatch-tui and netwatch-tui-bin on the AUR, tomasrivera the nixpkgs package, scillidan the Scoop entry, pavelzw the conda-forge feedstock, and the Homebrew maintainers took the formula into core. File packaging problems with them and netwatch bugs here.

@lamchau, @fdncred and @PeteE sent patches. Everyone who opened an issue with a repro or argued with a design decision is the reason the output is right on more terminals than mine.

Contributing

Discussions, issues, CONTRIBUTING.md.

License

MIT