Is there a good tool for monitoring network activity on Mac OS X?

Question

Is there a good bit of software on Mac OS X that I can use to monitor incoming and outgoing network activity? Nothing too geeky, I just want something simple to use.

I'm on version 10.6 (Snow Leopard) if that helps.

score 78 · Accepted Answer · edited Oct 11 '12 at 20:58

78

Wireshark is widely acknowledged as one of the best network monitor tools available. Distributions are available for OS X.

If you prefer something more simplistic you can use iStatMenus to show incoming / outgoing network traffic speeds.

For the person who doesn't want to install anything you can also use tcpdump in Terminal.

tcpdump -i [interface, en0 is ethernet, en1 is wireless]

edited Oct 11 '12 at 20:58

Burak Erdem

135
1
6

answered Mar 23 '10 at 03:40

Josh K

12,747
7
41
58

iStatMenus looks like the day to day winner, but I also appreciate the terminal command too for the quick/dirty way of doing it. – xentek Mar 23 '10 at 08:08
6

Wireshark is a packet analyzer with delusions of grander. It doesn't give a good view of everything going on, but it's great for going through packets with a hex editor. – vy32 May 26 '12 at 19:20
tcpdump is what I need here - for some reason, Private Eye wasn't showing me FTPS passive connections, but tcpdump did. – Michael H. Jun 06 '12 at 21:00

score 50 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 31 '12 at 08:18

50

Also check out nettop, a little command line gem that ships with Mac OS.

answered Dec 31 '12 at 08:18

SengMing

609
5
3

6

There is a useful 'delta output' mode which can be toggled with the 'd' key while app is running. It will show you the actual download/upload rates per second per connection. – Anton Matosov Sep 05 '14 at 04:54
Pressing the 'd' key didn't do anything for me (macOS 10.12.3) until I first ran nettop -d. It may have been that my terminal window wasn't wide enough initially. Pressing 'h' while running displays other available options. – MrG Feb 16 '17 at 07:41
1

`nettop -t wifi -P` has proven a good default for me. – Marcello Romani Feb 07 '22 at 14:57
Link is broken. – soundflix Jul 15 '23 at 19:22

score 30 · Answer 3 · edited Nov 27 '15 at 13:15

30

Also look at MenuMeters. I tried iStat Menus & MenuMeters and preferred MM. Not saying one is better; just that there are a couple of choices.

A working version of MenuMeters for El Capitan can be found here.

enter image description here

edited Nov 27 '15 at 13:15

user2707001

133
7

answered Apr 08 '10 at 12:58

JRobert

6,744
24
28

3

+1. MenuMeters beats iStat Menus anyday. – cOle2 Apr 08 '10 at 14:52
2

MM is also open-source. – Ashley Mar 24 '14 at 20:51
Light, functional and open-source application. What more can we ask? :) – Henrique de Sousa Jul 04 '15 at 12:56
Unfortunately this no longer works as of osx 10.11.1 El Capitan. – jfountain Oct 25 '15 at 22:22
1

I can confirm that the version of MenuMeters for El Capitan at http://member.ipmu.jp/yuji.tachikawa/MenuMetersElCapitan/ works as expected on that O/S. – boot13 Nov 27 '15 at 13:17
Still fully functional in Sierra 12.6. – JRobert Aug 09 '17 at 12:18
Try `brew cask install menumeters` if you use brew package manager – btwiuse May 13 '20 at 16:32
Still working in Mojave 10.14.6 – JRobert Sep 10 '20 at 21:22
Thanks for your sharing! This is exactly what I am looking for a long time! – Itachi Mar 04 '21 at 06:43

score 15 · Answer 4 · edited Oct 11 '12 at 20:57

15

LittleSnitch! - 30$

It is mainly a software Firewall that may help you to prevent some apps to access the internet. It also has a nice menubar icon with live network usage. Mouseover on it and it displays which app is communicating with which server or ip address.

I have LittleSnitch and iStat Menus installed. Both are complementary.

edited Oct 11 '12 at 20:57

Burak Erdem

135
1
6

answered Mar 23 '10 at 10:17

Arko

1,692
1
11
12

LittleSnitch will be a pain unless you're explicitly blocking stolen / cracked programs from calling home. Also the menu item is not nearly as informative as iStat. You'd have to open up the Network Monitor screen to get any benefit. – Josh K Mar 23 '10 at 17:50
Well, there is a lot of programs that are calling home and should not. If you are a bit concerned about security you will understand what I mean. The LittleSnitch's mouseouver pop-up is also great for showing realtime process-host network activity. But yes, it is not as informative as iStat. That's why i use both. – Arko Mar 24 '10 at 09:05
little snitch currently shows me my network history graph for one hour. is MenuMeters and Istat show less. do we have anything that shows more than 1 hour, say one day or a week? – nyxee Aug 09 '17 at 02:40

score 7 · Answer 5 · edited Apr 19 '12 at 00:20

7

Commercial (16$) iStat Pro and iStat Menus (dashboard widget and menu bar item respectively) are great for monitoring everything from network activity to CPU temperatures.

And of course there's the network tab of Activity Monitor.

edited Apr 19 '12 at 00:20

sorin

11,660
20
63
73

answered Mar 23 '10 at 03:39

Kevin Yap

1,017
10
14

+1 For mentioning Activity Monitor. For anyone with casual requirements who just needs to know their up/down speed this is a great solution, and it ships free with OS X. – Jonathan Nicol Jul 01 '14 at 09:55
iStat Pro no longer appears to be supported. – John Mark Mitchell Dec 13 '17 at 07:24

score 2 · Answer 6 · edited Apr 05 '13 at 20:27

2

Network Logger for Mac OS X from Group Mind does a great job of tracking network traffic, downtime (in real time, with timed log), and lots of easy-to-understand stuff. I'm not technical and all I really wanted was to track when my ISP connection went down, and for how long it stayed down. Mac's little Network Utility app would ping endlessly but wouldn't give me a chronological log. Network Logger did, and was easy for a novice to understand.

Cost me $5.99 from the App Store.

edited Apr 05 '13 at 20:27

Community

1

answered Jan 07 '13 at 04:11

user185006

21
1

3

Good first post. To round out your answer perhaps you could include a link to the app and a screenshot? Just a thought. – slm Jan 07 '13 at 04:29

score 1 · Answer 7 · answered May 25 '12 at 13:01

1

/System/Library/CoreServices/Network Diagnostics Simple green/red LEDs for various layers. I slide it over to the right side of the screen until just the lights show.

answered May 25 '12 at 13:01

CJ1

19
1

Tempted to downvote... How does this help "monitor incoming and outgoing network activity"? (If it does, please let me know; I'd love to use it!) – rinogo Aug 07 '14 at 04:34
I don't think this does what you think it does. This tool (command is `/System/Library/CoreServices/Network\ Diagnostics.app/Contents/MacOS/Network\ Diagnostics`) diagnosis WiFi or Ethernet connection issues. It doesn't monitor network activity. – matty Jun 28 '16 at 02:28

score 0 · Answer 8 · answered Apr 11 '10 at 01:59

0

I've just installed Net Monitor and Net Monitor Sidekick and so far I like them. Nothing you can't get with other tools, but a nice summary display. Each is $10 after a 30 day eval, so YMMV, but I thought I'd mention them.

answered Apr 11 '10 at 01:59

Fred

1,220
7
9

The URL provided is dead. The URL for Net Monitor and Net Monitor Sidekick has been updated to http://netmonitor.s3-website-us-east-1.amazonaws.com/ – John Mark Mitchell Dec 13 '17 at 07:29

Is there a good tool for monitoring network activity on Mac OS X?

8 Answers8

Linked