The flow is a real-time network traffic monitor for the terminal.

It is written in Go, uses Bubble Tea for the TUI interface, and works on GNU/Linux, macOS, and Windows.

Features:

• Download speed
• Upload speed
• Traffic graphs
• Transfer peaks
• Latency
• Network interface in use
• Processes with network connections
• Interface information, such as IP, MAC, and MTU
• Session/day traffic totals
• Custom themes and color schemes

The interface automatically adapts to the terminal size, offering four modes: Hero, Compact, Mini, and Tiny.

How to install

The project provides precompiled binaries for Linux, macOS, and Windows, for both amd64 and arm64. There are also platform-specific methods.

GNU/Linux

If you use Arch Linux, you can install it through the AUR:

yay -S flow-network-monitor-bin

Using Go

With Go installed:

go install github.com/programmersd21/flow/cmd/flow@latest

Verify:

flow

Building from source

git clone https://github.com/programmersd21/flow
cd flow
make install

The project also provides binaries directly on the releases page.

macOS

The simplest way is to use Homebrew:

brew install programmersd21/flow/flow

Then:

flow

Windows

On Windows, you can download the binary corresponding to your machine’s architecture from the project’s Releases page.

There are builds for:

amd64
arm64

The release process generates a .zip file for Windows.

After extracting the executable, you can run:

.\flow.exe

If you want to call flow directly from any terminal, add the executable’s folder to the Windows PATH.

Getting started

Once installed, simply run:

flow

The program automatically detects the network interface and starts monitoring.

View modes

You can start directly in different modes:

flow --compact

Compact layout.

flow --mini

Graphs only.

flow --tiny

A single line, ideal for status bars.

For example, the tiny mode can be integrated into tmux:

set -g status-right "#(flow --tiny --no-color)"

Choosing an interface

If the computer has multiple network interfaces:

flow --interface wlan0

You can also switch between interfaces within the application itself using:

i

Changing units

Press:

c

to switch between scales such as:

B/s
KB/s
MB/s

Or start using bits per second:

flow --bits

Changing the refresh interval

By default, flow works with a 100 ms sampling rate.

You can change it:

flow --refresh 500ms

Monitoring latency

You can set the destination used for the latency test:

flow --ping 8.8.8.8

The default address is 1.1.1.1.

Shortcuts

During execution:

JSON and automation

flow does not have to be used only as a TUI.

To get a single JSON output:

flow --json

To receive data continuously in JSON Lines:

flow --json-stream

This allows you to integrate flow with scripts, dashboards, and other terminal tools.

There is also:

flow --once

to get a single text output.

For more information, visit the repository.

go network tui terminal

Marcos Oliveira

Software developer

https://github.com/terroo