Network Monitor

Bitcoin Knots includes enhanced network monitoring through the gui_netwatch and gui_trafficgraph patches, providing real-time visibility into your node's network activity.

Features Overview

Feature	Description
Peer Monitor	Real-time peer connection status
Traffic Graph	Visual bandwidth usage over time
Connection Types	IPv4, IPv6, Tor, I2P breakdown
Block Propagation	See blocks as they arrive
Quality Indicators	Latency and reliability metrics

Accessing Network Information

Via Menu

Window → Peers — Detailed peer list with:

• IP addresses (or .onion addresses)
• Connection direction (in/out)
• Protocol version
• User agent string
• Ping time
• Bytes sent/received
• Block height

Window → Network Traffic — Traffic graph visualization

Via Status Bar

The status bar shows:

• Connection count indicator
• Sync progress
• Network activity icon

Click the network icon for quick stats.

Peer Monitor

Peer List Columns

Column	Description
Address	IP or onion address
Type	IPv4/IPv6/Onion/I2P
Network	mainnet/testnet
Services	Node capabilities
Starting Height	Peer's block height at connect
Sync Height	Current synced height
Ping	Round-trip latency
Sent/Received	Bandwidth usage

Connection Types

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                    Peer Connections                          │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│  Type        │ Count │ Description                          │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│  ● Outbound  │  8    │ Connections you initiated            │
│  ◐ Inbound   │  12   │ Connections others initiated         │
│  ◉ Manual    │  2    │ Manually added with -addnode         │
│  ○ Feeler    │  1    │ Temporary connection testing peer    │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Network Distribution

The monitor shows peer distribution across networks:

Network Breakdown:
├── IPv4:  45%  ████████████░░░░░░░░
├── IPv6:  20%  ████████░░░░░░░░░░░░
├── Onion: 30%  ██████████████░░░░░░
└── I2P:    5%  ██░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░

Traffic Graph

Enhanced Visualization

The gui_trafficgraph patches provide:

• Non-linear scaling — Better visibility of both small and large traffic
• Separate in/out — Distinct colors for upload/download
• Time range selection — View different time windows
• Tooltips — Exact values on hover

Reading the Graph

Traffic (last hour)
    ▲
  2 │     ╭─╮
MB/s│    ╱  ╲         ╭─╮
  1 │───╱────╲───────╱──╲──
    │  ╱      ╲─────╱    ╲
  0 └─────────────────────────▶
      -60min        -30min    now

    ── Received (download)
    ── Sent (upload)

Traffic Patterns

Normal operation:

• Steady baseline of ~1-10 KB/s
• Spikes when new blocks arrive
• Higher during initial sync

Initial sync:

• Sustained high download (blocks)
• Low upload
• May saturate connection

Serving peers:

• Higher upload if you have many inbound connections
• Spikes when serving historical blocks

Block Propagation

See when new blocks arrive:

Recent Blocks:
│ Height   │ Time       │ From Peer        │ Size    │
├──────────┼────────────┼──────────────────┼─────────┤
│ 870,123  │ 12:34:56   │ 192.168.1.5:8333 │ 1.2 MB  │
│ 870,122  │ 12:24:31   │ xyz...abc.onion  │ 1.8 MB  │
│ 870,121  │ 12:15:02   │ 10.0.0.8:8333    │ 0.9 MB  │

RPC Equivalents

The GUI displays data available via RPC:

# Peer information
bitcoin-cli getpeerinfo

# Network totals
bitcoin-cli getnettotals

# Network info summary
bitcoin-cli getnetworkinfo

# Connection count
bitcoin-cli getconnectioncount

Example: Peer Summary

# Get peer count by network
bitcoin-cli getpeerinfo | jq 'group_by(.network) | map({network: .[0].network, count: length})'

# Output:
# [
#   {"network": "ipv4", "count": 5},
#   {"network": "ipv6", "count": 2},
#   {"network": "onion", "count": 8}
# ]

Example: Traffic Stats

# Total bytes transferred
bitcoin-cli getnettotals

# Output:
# {
#   "totalbytesrecv": 1234567890,
#   "totalbytessent": 987654321,
#   "timemillis": 1699999999999
# }

Connection Health

Indicators

Indicator	Meaning
🟢 Green	Healthy connection
🟡 Yellow	High latency (>500ms)
🔴 Red	Connection issues
⚪ Gray	Disconnected/banned

Healthy Node Signs

• 8+ outbound connections — Good peer diversity
• Some inbound connections — Ports open, helping network
• Mixed network types — IPv4/IPv6/Tor diversity
• Low ping times — under 200ms typically
• Steady traffic — Not stuck or stalled

Warning Signs

• 0 connections — Network issue, check firewall
• Only outbound — Ports not forwarded
• No Tor peers — Consider enabling Tor

(Note: the peer "ban score" / misbehavior_score field is deprecated — it is always 0, or 100 just before a peer is disconnected — so it is not useful as a live health metric.)

Configuration Impact

Monitor shows effects of these settings:

bitcoin.conf

# Connection limits
maxconnections=125      # Total peer limit
maxuploadtarget=1000    # Upload target per 24 hours (MiB by default)

# Network selection: each onlynet= line adds a permitted network,
# so together these restrict connections to IPv4 and Tor only
onlynet=ipv4
onlynet=onion

# Peer management
addnode=x.x.x.x        # Always try to connect
connect=x.x.x.x        # ONLY connect to these

Debugging Network Issues

No Connections

# Check if listening
bitcoin-cli getnetworkinfo | grep '"localaddresses"'

# Check connection count
bitcoin-cli getconnectioncount

# Try adding a node
bitcoin-cli addnode "seed.bitcoin.sipa.be" onetry

Slow Sync

# Check peer sync status
bitcoin-cli getpeerinfo | jq '.[] | {addr, synced_blocks, inflight}'

# See if stuck on specific peer
# Look for peers with low synced_blocks

High Bandwidth Usage

# Check traffic
bitcoin-cli getnettotals

# Reduce connections if needed
# Edit bitcoin.conf: maxconnections=20

Knots Enhancements

Compared to Bitcoin Core, Knots adds:

Enhancement	Description
Non-linear graph	Better scaling for varying traffic
Network breakdown	Visual IPv4/IPv6/Tor/I2P split
Enhanced tooltips	More detailed hover information
Dark mode support	Proper theming in all views
Block arrival times	See propagation timing

GUI vs CLI Monitoring

Task	GUI	CLI
Quick status check	✓ Best	✓
Automated monitoring	✗	✓ Best
Historical data	✗	✓ (external tools)
Real-time visual	✓ Best	✗
Scriptable	✗	✓ Best

For automated monitoring, consider tools like:

• bitcoin-cli in scripts
• Prometheus + Grafana
• Custom monitoring solutions

See Also

• Dark Mode — UI theming options
• Mempool Stats — Transaction pool monitoring
• Tor Integration — Private networking
• Troubleshooting — Network issues