Glances
A cross-platform curses-based monitoring tool
Decision gist · record as of 2026-08-14
Yes. Glances is actively maintained, has no known vulnerabilities, installs with low friction, and solves a clear problem—real-time cross-platform system monitoring. It is suitable for system administrators, developers, and end users. The LGPL-3.0-only license is permissive for use but requires source disclosure if you redistribute modifications. Install the base package for terminal monitoring, or add [web] extras for the web interface.AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page — verify before relying
Before you install
- Python 3.10 or later required.
- On Linux, psutil may require python3-dev or python-devel headers to compile.
- Low install friction with a pure Python wheel distribution.
License · maintenance · safety
LGPL-3.0-only (copyleft) — Licensed under LGPL-3.0-only (copyleft). You may use and modify Glances freely, but any distributed modifications must also be licensed under LGPL-3.0-only and source code must be made available.
last release 2026-08-01 (13 days) · last repo commit 2026-08-08 · 33,364 stars
0 known vulnerabilities (OSV.dev, 2026-08-14) · 117,321 downloads/mo, #12,169 on PyPI
Alternatives
Verify before relying
pip install glances
glances
Or as a library:
from glances import api
gl = api.GlancesAPI()
print(gl.cpu["total"])- Whether the web interface (glances -w) requires additional dependencies beyond the base install
- Performance overhead of running Glances on resource-constrained systems
- Compatibility of remote monitoring (client/server mode) across different network configurations
What it is and what it does
Glances is a Python-based system monitoring tool that runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux, providing real-time visibility into CPU, memory, disk, network, and process metrics. It presents data through a terminal dashboard (using curses), a web interface, or command-line output in multiple formats (raw, CSV, JSON). The tool supports remote monitoring via client/server mode with XML-RPC and RESTful APIs, and can export statistics to external databases and services including InfluxDB, Prometheus, Elasticsearch, and others.
You can use Glances as a standalone command-line tool, a web server for browser-based monitoring, or as a Python library by importing the GlancesAPI class to programmatically access system metrics. It includes plugins for container monitoring (Docker, LXC), temperature and fan sensors, and running processes. The architecture is plugin-based, allowing developers to add custom monitoring modules.
Use it for
- Monitor system performance in real-time on a local machine using the terminal dashboard
- Set up remote monitoring of multiple servers via the web interface or client/server mode
- Export system metrics to time-series databases like Prometheus or InfluxDB for long-term analysis
- Embed system monitoring into Python applications via the GlancesAPI library
- Display specific metrics to stdout in CSV or JSON format for scripting and automation
- Monitor container resource usage alongside host metrics in Docker or LXC environments
Worth the install?
AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page. Verify before relying on it.
Yes.
Glances is actively maintained, has no known vulnerabilities, installs with low friction, and solves a clear problem—real-time cross-platform system monitoring. It is suitable for system administrators, developers, and end users. The LGPL-3.0-only license is permissive for use but requires source disclosure if you redistribute modifications. Install the base package for terminal monitoring, or add [web] extras for the web interface.
Install
glances on PyPI
Before you install
Low install friction with a pure Python wheel distribution. Actively maintained with a recent release (13 days old) and strong community engagement (33364 GitHub stars). Requires Python 3.10 or later and psutil as a core dependency; on some Linux systems you may need python3-psutil or python-dev headers pre-installed.
Python 3.10 or later required. On Linux, psutil may require python3-dev or python-devel headers to compile.
License in practice
Licensed under LGPL-3.0-only (copyleft). You may use and modify Glances freely, but any distributed modifications must also be licensed under LGPL-3.0-only and source code must be made available.
Quickstart
pip install glances
glances
Or as a library:
from glances import api
gl = api.GlancesAPI()
print(gl.cpu["total"])Verify before relying
- Whether the web interface (glances -w) requires additional dependencies beyond the base install
- Performance overhead of running Glances on resource-constrained systems
- Compatibility of remote monitoring (client/server mode) across different network configurations
Package facts
| License | LGPL-3.0-only copyleft |
| Python support | Supports the current Python release >=3.10 |
| Install friction | Low. Pure-Python wheel |
| Runtime dependencies | 7 packagesdefusedxmlpackagingpsutilwindows-cursesshtabjinja2pyinstrument |
| Maintenance | Actively maintained 13 days since the last release |
| Last repo commit | |
| First released | |
| Downloads | 117,321 / month, #12,169 on PyPI 30-day window, as of 2026-08-14 |
| Known vulnerabilities | None known OSV.dev, checked 2026-08-14 |
| Classifiers | Development Status :: 5 - Production/StableEnvironment :: Console :: CursesEnvironment :: Web EnvironmentFramework :: FastAPIIntended Audience :: DevelopersIntended Audience :: End Users/DesktopIntended Audience :: System AdministratorsOperating System :: OS IndependentProgramming Language :: Python :: 3Programming Language :: Python :: 3.10Programming Language :: Python :: 3.11Programming Language :: Python :: 3.12Programming Language :: Python :: 3.13Programming Language :: Python :: 3.14Topic :: System :: Monitoring |
Evidence: glances-4.5.6-py3-none-any.whl
Tags
Let your AI agent find packages like this
Example. Real query, live index.
You found this page by searching. An agent finds it by wishing: SkillFed indexes 14,416 PyPI packages by what they can do, searchable in plain language.
wish › “system monitoring tool”
- GlancesGlances is a cross-platform system monitoring tool that displays…
- mozsystemmonitorMonitors system resource usage by wrapping psutil, primarily for…
- circusCircus runs and watches multiple processes and sockets, offering…
Give your agent the search over MCP, or paste the wish link into any chat.
More Monitoring packages
Wraps any iterable to display a real-time progress bar in the terminal or Jupyter notebook, showing iteration count, elapsed time, and estimated time remaining.
Provides generated Python code for OpenTelemetry semantic conventions, enabling standardized attribute naming and constant definitions for instrumentation and telemetry collection.
Install it if you are using OpenTelemetry and want to follow semantic conventions correctly.
Provides the reference implementation of the OpenTelemetry API for collecting and exporting traces, metrics, and logs from Python applications.
Provides the abstract API and interfaces for OpenTelemetry instrumentation in Python, defining how to emit traces, metrics, and logs without tying code to a specific SDK implementation.
Exports OpenTelemetry observability data to an OpenTelemetry Collector using Protobuf-encoded messages over HTTP.
Install it if you are using OpenTelemetry in Python and need to send data to a Collector over HTTP.
Provides automatic instrumentation commands and programmatic APIs to inject distributed tracing into Python applications without code changes, detecting and instrumenting packages used by your program.
Install it if you need distributed tracing without code changes and have compatible instrumented packages in your environment.
See also glances-api · psutil · nvitop · archspec · flower · mozsystemmonitor · supervisor · opentelemetry-instrumentation-system-metrics · dumb-init · mss