Best Network Monitor Apps for Mac

The short answer. NetFluss is the menu bar throughput monitor with per-app attribution. Tracexy is the session-based traffic capture and PCAP investigator, which is the tool for “what was actually sent”. Sloth shows every open file, socket, pipe and device in use by every process, which is the system-level view rather than the network-level one. WiFi Lens covers the radio. Speediness covers the internet link. iStats is the command-line system information tool that happens to include network counters. The dividing question is how deep you need to go: a rate, a per-app attribution, a socket list, or the packets themselves, because each step down is a different tool and a different level of expertise.

This guide covers 6 network monitor apps for macOS. Every fact below is drawn from the same verified records that back each app’s own page. The recommendations are our editorial judgment, not payment.

Quick comparison

What actually decides this

• Rate, attribution, socket or packet. Four levels of detail, four tools. Most problems are solved at the first two. Reaching for a packet capture to answer “why is the video call bad” is a common way to spend an evening learning nothing.
• Whether it runs continuously. A monitor in the menu bar is always on and cheap. A capture is started deliberately and produces a file that grows. The always-on tool is for noticing; the deliberate one is for investigating.
• What it can attribute to an app. Total throughput is a number. Throughput per process requires privileged access and a mapping from socket to process. Tools that show the second are doing more work and asking for more permission.
• Whether it can read a capture later. Capturing live traffic and investigating a saved PCAP are different capabilities. If the problem is intermittent, the second is the only one that helps, because the capture can be taken now and read tomorrow.
• What the overhead is. A counter is free. A packet capture on a busy interface is not, and the capture itself can change the timing being measured. This is the first thing to consider before leaving a capture running.

Our picks

• NetFluss — Its record describes real-time speeds and the top bandwidth-using apps, which is the attribution case. Choose it when you want to see which app is using the connection right now.
• Tracexy — Its record describes session-based network intelligence for capturing live traffic and investigating PCAP files locally, which is the capture case. Choose it when you need to capture traffic and investigate it later.
• Sloth — Its record describes showing all open files, directories, sockets, pipes and devices in use by running processes, which is the system-level case. Choose it when you want to see every socket and file a process has open.
• WiFi Lens — Its record describes spectrum scanning and channel congestion visualisation, which is the radio case. Choose it when the problem is the radio rather than the traffic.
• iStats — Its record describes a command-line system information tool, which is the scriptable case. Choose it when you want the numbers from a terminal.

The apps

iStats

iStats is a system tool for macOS. Command-line system information tool. It is released under MIT.

What it does. Ruby gem for your mac stats.

Full profile and verified facts for iStats →

NetFluss

NetFluss is a system tool for macOS. Native menu bar app for real-time upload/download speeds and top bandwidth-using apps. It is released under GPL-3.0.

What it does. A light-weight & open-source menubar app that shows current upload & download speed plus the top apps using bandwidth - rana-gmbh/NetFluss.

NetFluss is listed with current version 2.6.

Full profile and verified facts for NetFluss →

Sloth

Sloth is a system tool for macOS. Shows all open files, directories, sockets, pipes and devices in use by all running processes. It is released under BSD-3-Clause.

What it does. Mac app that shows all open files, directories, sockets, pipes and devices in use by all running processes. Nice GUI for lsof.

Sloth is listed with current version 3.6.

Full profile and verified facts for Sloth →

Speediness

Speediness is a Mac utility for macOS. Check your internet speed. It is free.

What it does. Check your internet speed. Quickly check your internet connection speed, ping, and RPM.

Speediness is listed with current version 2.0.2.

Full profile and verified facts for Speediness →

Tracexy

Tracexy is a networking tool for macOS. Open-source, session-based network intelligence for capturing live traffic and investigating PCAP/PCAPNG files locally. It is released under AGPL-3.0.

Tracexy is listed with current version 0.8.1.

Full profile and verified facts for Tracexy →

WiFi Lens

WiFi Lens is a networking tool for macOS. Native open-source Wi-Fi analyzer and network diagnostics app with real-time spectrum scanning, channel congestion visualization, and BLE device tracking. It is released under Apache-2.0.

What it does. Native open-source network diagnostics app for macOS with built-in Wi-Fi analysis. - ShiinaLabs/wifi-lens.

WiFi Lens is listed with current version 1.6.0.

Full profile and verified facts for WiFi Lens →

How to choose

• Free of charge. Speediness — no payment is required.
• No licence fee, source available. iStats, NetFluss, Sloth, Tracexy and WiFi Lens — the source can be read and, under the terms of each licence, reused.

Open source: iStats, NetFluss, Sloth, Tracexy and WiFi Lens (5 of 6).

Common mistakes

• Starting a packet capture to answer a question a throughput monitor would have answered.
• Leaving a capture running for hours and filling the disk.
• Reading total throughput as per-app usage. The first number says nothing about the second.
• Forgetting that a VPN moves the traffic and changes what the socket list means.

How this guide was put together

Each app’s facts come from its own record: the developer’s own pages and repository, the App Store listing where one exists, and the documentation, each with a source grade and an access date. Where a fact rests on the developer’s own statement rather than on something we verified independently, the sentence says so. Where our data has no value for something, the guide says “not published” instead of guessing.

A price appears here only where the record carries one from a stated source; the guide never estimates one, and it records the pricing model alongside so the two can be read together. Prices change and vary by region, so each app links to its own page for the current detail.

The facts and the recommendations are kept apart on purpose. Everything in the app entries, the comparison table and the answers above is composed from the records. The short answer, the criteria and the picks are our editorial judgment: they reflect what we would choose and why, and they are not paid for. Where we make a recommendation we name the condition it applies under, because we do not call anything “the best” without explaining the criteria.