Process Monitoring Software
Alternatives to PM2
PM2 combines application supervision with production monitoring. Its daemon manager keeps applications online through cluster mode, zero-downtime reloads, watch-and-restart behavior, startup scripts, log management, and memory-based reloads. PM2 Plus adds a web view for Node.js applications, issue tracking, custom metrics, server health checks, V8 monitoring, and email or Slack notifications. Container operation and deployment integrations extend its process-management scope, while Enterprise adds profiling, transaction tracing, and longer data retention.
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Ambih Monitor It is aimed at individual developers monitoring dev servers, desktop apps, games, ML workloads, or GPU-accelerated apps.
From $4.58/mo Free plan Windows9.1 Visit Specs - 02 Glances
Glances suits people who want system statistics and process monitoring across supported systems, including remote views or exports.
Free plan Open source Web · Windows · macOS · Linux8.9 Visit Specs - 03 Process Lasso
Process Lasso suits Windows users who want to automate process priorities, affinities, power plans, or sleep prevention.
From $1.25/mo Free plan Windows8.5 Visit Specs - 04 runit
runit suits Unix administrators who need service supervision, process controls and logging, either as an init replacement or alongside an existing init scheme.
Free plan Open source macOS · Linux · Self-hosted8.2 Visit Specs - 05
Autoruns Autoruns suits Windows users who want to inspect and manage configured startup entries, including entries for other accounts.
Free plan Windows8.0 Visit Specs - 06 bottom (btm)
bottom suits users who want terminal-based system monitoring and process controls on an officially supported desktop operating system.
Free plan Windows · macOS · Linux8.0 Visit Specs - 07
AppControl AppControl suits Windows users investigating background activity, including gamers, IT professionals, privacy-conscious users, and people troubleshooting applications.
Free plan Windows7.9 Visit Specs - 08 OpenProcMon
OpenProcMon suits Windows users who need detailed process, file, registry, or network activity logs, and developers building on its SDK or MCP tools.
Free plan Windows7.9 Visit Specs - 09 Monit
Monit suits administrators who want self-hosted monitoring and automated maintenance for Unix systems.
Free plan macOS · Linux · Self-hosted7.8 Visit Specs - 10 NVTOP Free plan Linux · Self-hosted7.8 Visit Specs
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Linux administrators and performance analysts who need interval-based system, process, thread, and cgroup activity records.
Free plan Linux7.7 Visit Specs - 12 btop
btop suits Linux and macOS users who want to inspect system and process activity in a terminal.
Free plan macOS · Linux7.7 Visit Specs - 13
htop htop suits users who need terminal-based process monitoring on Linux or macOS and related Unix systems.
Free plan macOS · Linux7.7 Visit Specs - 14 iotop
Linux administrators and developers who need process-level I/O visibility.
Free plan Linux7.6 Visit Specs - 15 nmon
It suits advanced end users, developers, and system administrators working with Linux performance data.
Free plan Linux · Self-hosted7.6 Visit Specs - 16 Owlette From $20/mo Web · Windows · API · Self-hosted7.6 Visit Specs
- 17 Remote Process Explorer
It suits Windows users who need to inspect or control processes across local and remote computers.
Free plan Windows7.6 Visit Specs - 18 ManageEngine Free Process Manager
It suits Windows users who need to inspect local or remote process memory and close processes, including troubleshooting a slow remote machine.
Free plan Windows7.5 Visit Specs - 19
TaskExplorer From €5/mo Windows · Linux7.4 Visit Specs - 20 Supervisor
Supervisor suits system administrators who need to manage project- or customer-related processes on UNIX-like systems.
Web · macOS · Linux · API7.3 Visit Specs - 21 System Informer Free plan Windows7.3 Visit Specs
- 22 s6 Free plan Linux · Self-hosted7.2 Visit Specs
- 23 rproc Linux6.7 Visit Specs
- 24 winproc-tui Windows6.7 Visit Specs
- 25 Process Monitor for Linux Linux5.4 Visit Specs
Choosing instead of PM2
Readers may switch when they need a narrower monitor, different operating-system coverage, or more specialized automation. PM2 runs across Linux, macOS, Windows, web, API, and self-hosted environments. Runtime is free, Plus costs $79 a month, and Enterprise has no price listed. Its pricing FAQ says excess processes may be randomly ignored after a plan limit is exceeded. Compare whether you need application uptime controls or system-wide statistics, terminal inspection, Windows priority automation, Unix service repair, process-event analysis, or run-to-run resource comparisons. Also weigh interfaces, alerting, integrations, and whether the alternative actively manages services or mainly observes them.