{"slug": "btop", "name": "btop", "category": "observability", "category_name": "Monitoring and analytics", "description": "Terminal-based resource monitor showing CPU, memory, disk, network, and process stats.", "recommenders": 5, "commenters": 9, "warners": 1, "score": 4.209, "rising": -1.64, "first": "2025-11-08", "latest": "2026-09-23", "why": "HN commenters like btop for its modern, informative interface, which shows CPU, GPU, network and disk stats in one place, and for how well it fits terminal-centric workflows.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 5, "neutral": 2, "compare": 1, "warn": 1}, "spark": [2, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": ["Terminal workflow fit", "Liked interface"], "caveat": "Memory leak", "short_quote": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface,  useful and informative, that I needed.", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": "github.com/aristocratos/btop", "official_url": "https://github.com/aristocratos/btop", "pricing": "open source", "aliases": ["btop"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters like btop for its modern, informative interface", "cites": [{"id": 780571264, "item_id": 48785704, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48785704", "by": "imrehg", "date": "2026-07-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface,  useful and informative, that I needed.", "excerpt": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface, useful and informative, that I needed. As others mention it - it seems to shows the Watts used as well :) (and network, and GPU, and disks,....) [0]: https://github.com/aristocratos/btop", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Explanation of everything you can see in htop/top on Linux"}, {"id": 733743072, "item_id": 45858942, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45858942", "by": "willis936", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love btop.", "excerpt": "I love btop. It's missing a few things I like from my rainmeter setup. - per physical core clock next to the per core temperature and usage - multiple top subwindows that can each be sorted by different things (it's nice to see who's hogging CPU, memory, and GPU) - more UPS / battery support, namely hooks into power usage", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}, {"id": 733723968, "item_id": 45857748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45857748", "by": "dkdcio", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I do love btop.", "excerpt": "I wouldn\u2019t call it \u201cgamified\u201d but I do love btop. the one thing missing for me is GPU usage on MacOS (I use asitop for that)", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}]}, {"text": ", which shows CPU, GPU, network and disk stats in one place", "cites": [{"id": 780571264, "item_id": 48785704, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48785704", "by": "imrehg", "date": "2026-07-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface,  useful and informative, that I needed.", "excerpt": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface, useful and informative, that I needed. As others mention it - it seems to shows the Watts used as well :) (and network, and GPU, and disks,....) [0]: https://github.com/aristocratos/btop", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Explanation of everything you can see in htop/top on Linux"}, {"id": 762400688, "item_id": 47650043, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47650043", "by": "synergy20", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "excerpt": "would be nice to have cpu usage added so I have all in one? currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "context": "", "use_case": "system and GPU monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Zml-smi: universal monitoring tool for GPUs, TPUs and NPUs"}]}, {"text": ", and for how well it fits terminal-centric workflows.", "cites": [{"id": 768034819, "item_id": 48002176, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48002176", "by": "samgranieri", "date": "2026-05-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Using things like k9s / btop / lazygit / lazydocker helm / stern", "excerpt": "I spend all day in a terminal multiplexer (zellij) with neovim and other splits. Using things like k9s / btop / lazygit / lazydocker helm / stern / whatever that systemd TUI I saw in here and started and will check out later just keeps me focused in one window, and that\u2019s pretty cool", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Why TUIs Are Back"}, {"id": 762482753, "item_id": 47655172, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47655172", "by": "nickjj", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "splits btop and a dedicated GPU monitoring tool", "excerpt": "This is what I use too, the nice thing about this is you can use your existing tools natively and you have lots of flexibility in how you want them arranged. Could be split panes in 1 window or different windows in their own session. For example I have a `monitor` script in my dotfiles at https://github.com/nickjj/dotfiles/blob/master/.local/bin/monitor which for now just splits btop and a dedicated GPU monitoring to", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Perfmon \u2013 Consolidate your favorite CLI monitoring tools into a single TUI"}]}, {"text": " The main caveats are a reported memory leak during long uptimes", "cites": [{"id": 733766752, "item_id": 45860422, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45860422", "by": "trevortheblack", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "warn", "quote": "btop leaks memory like crazy", "excerpt": "I used to have btop running in a stand-alone terminal, so that I could monitor my system for any weirdness, but I ended up ending the practice as btop leaks memory like crazy: https://github.com/aristocratos/btop/issues/912 It wasn't uncommon for gigabytes of ram getting taken up after a day or two of uptime", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}]}, {"text": " and limited GPU monitoring, with only basic GPU load and no GPU usage on macOS.", "cites": [{"id": 762400688, "item_id": 47650043, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47650043", "by": "synergy20", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "excerpt": "would be nice to have cpu usage added so I have all in one? currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "context": "", "use_case": "system and GPU monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Zml-smi: universal monitoring tool for GPUs, TPUs and NPUs"}, {"id": 733723968, "item_id": 45857748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45857748", "by": "dkdcio", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I do love btop.", "excerpt": "I wouldn\u2019t call it \u201cgamified\u201d but I do love btop. the one thing missing for me is GPU usage on MacOS (I use asitop for that)", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Terminal workflow fit", "summary": "Commenters run it alongside other TUI tools in tmux or zellij splits.", "quotes": [{"id": 768034819, "item_id": 48002176, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48002176", "by": "samgranieri", "date": "2026-05-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Using things like k9s / btop / lazygit / lazydocker helm / stern", "excerpt": "I spend all day in a terminal multiplexer (zellij) with neovim and other splits. Using things like k9s / btop / lazygit / lazydocker helm / stern / whatever that systemd TUI I saw in here and started and will check out later just keeps me focused in one window, and that\u2019s pretty cool", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Why TUIs Are Back"}, {"id": 762482753, "item_id": 47655172, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47655172", "by": "nickjj", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "splits btop and a dedicated GPU monitoring tool", "excerpt": "This is what I use too, the nice thing about this is you can use your existing tools natively and you have lots of flexibility in how you want them arranged. Could be split panes in 1 window or different windows in their own session. For example I have a `monitor` script in my dotfiles at https://github.com/nickjj/dotfiles/blob/master/.local/bin/monitor which for now just splits btop and a dedicated GPU monitoring to", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Perfmon \u2013 Consolidate your favorite CLI monitoring tools into a single TUI"}, {"id": 797047332, "item_id": 49815458, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49815458", "by": "rsmedrano", "date": "2026-09-23", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Every tool it shows you (zellij, yazi, btop, gping, ctop, rclone)", "excerpt": "Hi HN, author here. I got tired of juggling separate SSH sessions across my phone, laptop and an old e-reader just to check on a few machines at home, so I built this: one persistent zellij session on whatever machine stays on (I call it \"the brain\"), laid out once from a profile. Every device with a terminal drops into the same session -- same tabs, same scrollback. A few decisions I'd be curious to hear opinions on", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Phosphor Deck \u2013 one zellij session your phone and laptop share"}]}, {"label": "Liked interface", "summary": "Commenters say they love it and call its interface modern, useful and informative.", "quotes": [{"id": 780571264, "item_id": 48785704, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48785704", "by": "imrehg", "date": "2026-07-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface,  useful and informative, that I needed.", "excerpt": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface, useful and informative, that I needed. As others mention it - it seems to shows the Watts used as well :) (and network, and GPU, and disks,....) [0]: https://github.com/aristocratos/btop", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Explanation of everything you can see in htop/top on Linux"}, {"id": 733743072, "item_id": 45858942, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45858942", "by": "willis936", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love btop.", "excerpt": "I love btop. It's missing a few things I like from my rainmeter setup. - per physical core clock next to the per core temperature and usage - multiple top subwindows that can each be sorted by different things (it's nice to see who's hogging CPU, memory, and GPU) - more UPS / battery support, namely hooks into power usage", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}, {"id": 733723968, "item_id": 45857748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45857748", "by": "dkdcio", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I do love btop.", "excerpt": "I wouldn\u2019t call it \u201cgamified\u201d but I do love btop. the one thing missing for me is GPU usage on MacOS (I use asitop for that)", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}]}, {"label": "All-in-one stats", "summary": "It shows CPU, GPU, network, disks and power use in a single view.", "quotes": [{"id": 780571264, "item_id": 48785704, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48785704", "by": "imrehg", "date": "2026-07-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface,  useful and informative, that I needed.", "excerpt": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface, useful and informative, that I needed. As others mention it - it seems to shows the Watts used as well :) (and network, and GPU, and disks,....) [0]: https://github.com/aristocratos/btop", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Explanation of everything you can see in htop/top on Linux"}, {"id": 762400688, "item_id": 47650043, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47650043", "by": "synergy20", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "excerpt": "would be nice to have cpu usage added so I have all in one? currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "context": "", "use_case": "system and GPU monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Zml-smi: universal monitoring tool for GPUs, TPUs and NPUs"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Memory leak", "summary": "One user stopped running it continuously after it consumed gigabytes of RAM over a day or two.", "quotes": [{"id": 733766752, "item_id": 45860422, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45860422", "by": "trevortheblack", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "warn", "quote": "btop leaks memory like crazy", "excerpt": "I used to have btop running in a stand-alone terminal, so that I could monitor my system for any weirdness, but I ended up ending the practice as btop leaks memory like crazy: https://github.com/aristocratos/btop/issues/912 It wasn't uncommon for gigabytes of ram getting taken up after a day or two of uptime", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}]}, {"label": "Limited GPU support", "summary": "GPU monitoring is basic, missing on macOS, and some users pair it with a dedicated GPU tool.", "quotes": [{"id": 762400688, "item_id": 47650043, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47650043", "by": "synergy20", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "excerpt": "would be nice to have cpu usage added so I have all in one? currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "context": "", "use_case": "system and GPU monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Zml-smi: universal monitoring tool for GPUs, TPUs and NPUs"}, {"id": 733723968, "item_id": 45857748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45857748", "by": "dkdcio", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I do love btop.", "excerpt": "I wouldn\u2019t call it \u201cgamified\u201d but I do love btop. the one thing missing for me is GPU usage on MacOS (I use asitop for that)", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}, {"id": 762482753, "item_id": 47655172, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47655172", "by": "nickjj", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "splits btop and a dedicated GPU monitoring tool", "excerpt": "This is what I use too, the nice thing about this is you can use your existing tools natively and you have lots of flexibility in how you want them arranged. Could be split panes in 1 window or different windows in their own session. For example I have a `monitor` script in my dotfiles at https://github.com/nickjj/dotfiles/blob/master/.local/bin/monitor which for now just splits btop and a dedicated GPU monitoring to", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Perfmon \u2013 Consolidate your favorite CLI monitoring tools into a single TUI"}]}, {"label": "Missing features", "summary": "One user wants per-core clocks, multiple separately sorted process panes and better UPS/battery support.", "quotes": [{"id": 733743072, "item_id": 45858942, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45858942", "by": "willis936", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love btop.", "excerpt": "I love btop. It's missing a few things I like from my rainmeter setup. - per physical core clock next to the per core temperature and usage - multiple top subwindows that can each be sorted by different things (it's nice to see who's hogging CPU, memory, and GPU) - more UPS / battery support, namely hooks into power usage", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}]}], "who": [], "tags": ["for terminal users", "for tmux/zellij setups"], "use_cases": ["system monitoring", "system and gpu monitoring"], "compared": [{"slug": "htop", "name": "htop", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "zellij", "name": "Zellij", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45856987", "title": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49815457", "title": "Phosphor Deck \u2013 one zellij session your phone and laptop share", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48784777", "title": "Explanation of everything you can see in htop/top on Linux", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48000028", "title": "Why TUIs Are Back", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47649701", "title": "Perfmon \u2013 Consolidate your favorite CLI monitoring tools into a single TUI", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47587089", "title": "Zml-smi: universal monitoring tool for GPUs, TPUs and NPUs", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"recommend": 2, "compare": 1, "warn": 1}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {"recommend": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-05": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 797047332, "item_id": 49815458, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49815458", "by": "rsmedrano", "date": "2026-09-23", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Every tool it shows you (zellij, yazi, btop, gping, ctop, rclone)", "excerpt": "Hi HN, author here. I got tired of juggling separate SSH sessions across my phone, laptop and an old e-reader just to check on a few machines at home, so I built this: one persistent zellij session on whatever machine stays on (I call it \"the brain\"), laid out once from a profile. Every device with a terminal drops into the same session -- same tabs, same scrollback. A few decisions I'd be curious to hear opinions on", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Phosphor Deck \u2013 one zellij session your phone and laptop share"}, {"id": 780571264, "item_id": 48785704, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48785704", "by": "imrehg", "date": "2026-07-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface,  useful and informative, that I needed.", "excerpt": "I've relatively recently migrated over to using btop[0], and it's the kind of modern interface, useful and informative, that I needed. As others mention it - it seems to shows the Watts used as well :) (and network, and GPU, and disks,....) [0]: https://github.com/aristocratos/btop", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Explanation of everything you can see in htop/top on Linux"}, {"id": 768034819, "item_id": 48002176, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48002176", "by": "samgranieri", "date": "2026-05-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Using things like k9s / btop / lazygit / lazydocker helm / stern", "excerpt": "I spend all day in a terminal multiplexer (zellij) with neovim and other splits. Using things like k9s / btop / lazygit / lazydocker helm / stern / whatever that systemd TUI I saw in here and started and will check out later just keeps me focused in one window, and that\u2019s pretty cool", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Why TUIs Are Back"}, {"id": 762482753, "item_id": 47655172, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47655172", "by": "nickjj", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "splits btop and a dedicated GPU monitoring tool", "excerpt": "This is what I use too, the nice thing about this is you can use your existing tools natively and you have lots of flexibility in how you want them arranged. Could be split panes in 1 window or different windows in their own session. For example I have a `monitor` script in my dotfiles at https://github.com/nickjj/dotfiles/blob/master/.local/bin/monitor which for now just splits btop and a dedicated GPU monitoring to", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Perfmon \u2013 Consolidate your favorite CLI monitoring tools into a single TUI"}, {"id": 762400688, "item_id": 47650043, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47650043", "by": "synergy20", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "excerpt": "would be nice to have cpu usage added so I have all in one? currently I use btop which shows basic gpu load along with cpu, network, etc.", "context": "", "use_case": "system and GPU monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Zml-smi: universal monitoring tool for GPUs, TPUs and NPUs"}, {"id": 733766752, "item_id": 45860422, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45860422", "by": "trevortheblack", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "warn", "quote": "btop leaks memory like crazy", "excerpt": "I used to have btop running in a stand-alone terminal, so that I could monitor my system for any weirdness, but I ended up ending the practice as btop leaks memory like crazy: https://github.com/aristocratos/btop/issues/912 It wasn't uncommon for gigabytes of ram getting taken up after a day or two of uptime", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}, {"id": 733743072, "item_id": 45858942, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45858942", "by": "willis936", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love btop.", "excerpt": "I love btop. It's missing a few things I like from my rainmeter setup. - per physical core clock next to the per core temperature and usage - multiple top subwindows that can each be sorted by different things (it's nice to see who's hogging CPU, memory, and GPU) - more UPS / battery support, namely hooks into power usage", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}, {"id": 733727569, "item_id": 45857973, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45857973", "by": "shevy-java", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Is btop basically just extending where it can run?", "excerpt": "Does anyone know the difference? I have been using htop since about 20 years. Is btop basically just extending where it can run?", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}, {"id": 733723968, "item_id": 45857748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45857748", "by": "dkdcio", "date": "2025-11-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I do love btop.", "excerpt": "I wouldn\u2019t call it \u201cgamified\u201d but I do love btop. the one thing missing for me is GPU usage on MacOS (I use asitop for that)", "context": "", "use_case": "system monitoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "Btop: A better modern alternative of htop with a gamified interface"}]}