Terminal Hacks - Monitor System Activity
This hack will show you how to display system information (process statistics and resource usage) as well as a real time list of processes and threads that are currently running. An alternative to having to open the Activity Monitor application on your Mac.
Show System Activity Monitor
Open Terminal: Finder > Applications > Utilities
In Terminal, type or paste the following…
top(return)
By default %CPU is the default sort column (highlighted in white).
To exit the activity monitor, type or paste the following…
q(return)
Show System Activity Monitor and Define a Column to Sort By
Open Terminal: Finder > Applications > Utilities
In Terminal, type or paste one of the following…
top -o cpuTo sort by %CPU [central processing unit usage]
top -o memTo sort by %MEM [memory usage]
top -o pidTo sort by PID [a task's unique process ID]
top -o timeTo sort by TIME [the amount of time in hundredths of a second a process has run for since last reboot]
top -o commandTo sort by COMMAND [the command that initiated the process]
(return)
::TIP:: you can sort by any column displayed in the activity monitor simply type the columns name after top -o.
Terminating a Process
Make a note of the PID ID number shown in the activity monitor.
Open Terminal: Finder > Applications > Utilities
In Terminal, type or paste one of the following…
kill 0000[replace 0000 with the PID number of the process you wish to terminate]
(return)
Originally posted 31 January, 2025. Updated 30, July 2026.
