otop 0.1.22

A btop-like monitor of CPUs, memory, GPUs (NVIDIA and Apple) and processes, in the terminal
otop-0.1.22 is not a library.

otop

CPUs, memory, GPUs and processes in the terminal, like btop, with the GPU detail of nvtop. On Linux and macOS.

  • CPU: total use over time, and each CPU's use.
  • Memory: RAM and swap, and RAM over time.
  • GPUs: a panel for each, with utilisation and memory, and charts of both over time.
    • NVIDIA's, through NVML, loaded at run time from the driver (libnvidia-ml.so), so no CUDA toolkit is needed: temperature, P-state, power, fan, clocks, PCIe, encoder and decoder too.
    • Apple's, on macOS, from the IORegistry, without root.
    • Without either, otop runs without GPU panels.
  • Processes: every process, with its user, CPU, memory, and for those on an NVIDIA GPU, which GPUs, GPU memory and SM use. Search them with /, and stop the one picked with k.

Install

cargo install otop

Use

otop             # sample every second
otop -d 500      # every 500 ms
otop --once      # print one sample as text, and exit
otop mcp         # serve it all to AI agents over MCP (below)
Key Does
q quit
↑ ↓ PgUp PgDn pick a process
/ search processes by command, user or PID
Enter / Esc keep the search / clear it
k, F9 stop the process picked: t terminates, 9 kills
s sort by CPU, memory, GPU memory, SM, PID, user
r reverse the sort
g list every process, those on a GPU, or on one GPU
h hide or show the charts
v GPU charts: split, one per GPU, or combined
+ - refresh faster or slower

Use from AI agents (MCP)

otop mcp is a Model Context Protocol server on stdin and stdout, so Claude, Cursor and other agents can see what the machine is doing. Its tools only read; none stops a process.

Tool Gives
status CPU use, overall and per CPU; memory and swap; each GPU's use, memory, temperature, power, clocks and PCIe
processes the busiest processes, with CPU, memory, command and GPU use; by search, gpu_only or gpu, sorted, up to limit (20 unless asked)
watch the least, mean and most CPU, memory and each GPU's use over seconds (1 to 30), sampled every interval_ms

Claude Code:

claude mcp add otop -- otop mcp

Cursor (~/.cursor/mcp.json, or .cursor/mcp.json in a project), Claude Desktop (claude_desktop_config.json), and most other clients:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "otop": { "command": "otop", "args": ["mcp"] }
  }
}

A machine elsewhere, such as a GPU server, is reached through SSH, with otop installed there and a key that needs no password:

claude mcp add gpubox -- ssh gpubox otop mcp

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "gpubox": { "command": "ssh", "args": ["gpubox", "otop", "mcp"] }
  }
}

If otop is not on the PATH the client starts it with (or the remote shell's), give its full path, such as ~/.cargo/bin/otop.