Network Tab¶
The Network tab (tab 4) provides detailed information about all network interfaces on the system.
Interface list¶
Each network interface is displayed with:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Name | Interface name (e.g., eth0, wlan0) |
| Status | Link state (Up / Down) |
| IPv4 | IPv4 address |
| IPv6 | IPv6 address (if configured) |
| MAC | Hardware MAC address |
| RX rate | Current receive throughput (bytes/sec) |
| TX rate | Current transmit throughput (bytes/sec) |
The loopback interface (lo) is filtered out by default.
Throughput sparklines¶
Each interface includes RX and TX sparklines showing throughput history over the last 60 samples (configurable via history_size in the config file).
Rates are displayed in human-readable format:
- Bytes/sec for low traffic
- KB/s, MB/s, GB/s as appropriate
Data source¶
Network data is parsed from /proc/net/dev, which provides cumulative byte and packet counters for each interface. pitop calculates the per-second rate by comparing consecutive samples at each tick interval.
Interface discovery¶
Interfaces are discovered dynamically each tick. New interfaces (e.g., a USB Ethernet adapter plugged in) appear automatically. Removed interfaces are pruned from the display and their sparkline history is cleaned up to prevent unbounded memory growth.
Tip
On a typical Raspberry Pi, you will see:
eth0-- wired Ethernet (Pi 4B, Pi 5)wlan0-- Wi-Fiend0-- wired Ethernet (newer naming on some Pi 5 images)