RustNet is a terminal network monitor that shows live TCP, UDP, and QUIC connections with process attribution when available. It runs on Linux, macOS, Windows, and FreeBSD.

Install

On macOS or Linux with Homebrew:

Packet capture needs platform-specific permissions. See the installation guide for Linux capabilities, macOS PKTAP and BPF access, other package managers, and troubleshooting.

Release status: The highlights, GIF, and screenshots below reflect v1.6.0. The guides linked from main may also describe unreleased changes. For the installed release, use the v1.6.0 documentation and check rustnet --version and rustnet --help.

Demo

Highlights

• Shows connection state, traffic, application protocol, and available process information in a terminal UI that works over SSH.
• Identifies protocols such as HTTP, TLS/SNI, DNS, SSH, and QUIC through packet inspection.
• Filters connections by process, address, port, protocol, and more.
• Exports captures as PCAP or PCAPNG with best-effort annotations for analysis in Wireshark.
• Reduces privileges after startup and uses platform sandboxing where supported.

See the usage guide, architecture guide, and security guide for feature details.

Screenshots

Other installation methods

Windows also requires Npcap. For v1.6.0, enable its "WinPcap API compatible mode". For openSUSE, Pop!_OS, FreeBSD, Docker, and source builds, see the installation guide.

Run

On Linux, after configuring capabilities:

On macOS, PKTAP requires sudo. With BPF access configured, RustNet can run without it but uses lsof for process detection.

Press / to filter connections, Enter to inspect one, and q to quit. See the usage guide for interface selection, options, controls, filters, and exports.

Documentation

• Installation: platforms, permissions, and troubleshooting
• Usage: controls, filtering, automation, and capture exports
• Security: sandboxing and privilege management
• Architecture: platform backends and performance
• Kubernetes and containers: attribution and capture exports
• Changelog: releases and upcoming changes
• Contributing: how to contribute

RustNet uses ratatui for its terminal UI and libpcap/Npcap for packet capture. See CONTRIBUTORS.md for project contributors.

Licensed under Apache License 2.0.