How to Install Glances on Ubuntu 26.04 and Debian 13 Trixie

Server administrators need enterprise level monitoring tools to monitor various things on a server. Zabbix is one such monitoring solution, and a complete tutorial to install and configure Zabbix on Ubuntu 26.04 is already published. Another great tool is Glances which you can use for the same purpose.

Glances is also a free and open-source tool to monitor everything on a server. Using Glances, you can monitor CPU, RAM, Load, Disk I/O, network interface, and much more in real time. Glances is developed on Python and uses psutil library to fetch information. You can even configure it to set threshold for various things and see the them in different colours.

The method mentioned below can be used to configure Glances on both Ubuntu 26.04 and Debian 13 Trixie.

So without talking much, let’s get going

Table of Contents

1. Prerequisites
2. Step 1 – Update the system
3. Step 2 – Install Glances
4. Step 3 – Launching Glances CLI
5. Step 4 – Changing threshold limits
6. Conclusion

Prerequisites

• A server running Ubuntu 26.04 or Debian 13 (Trixie)
• A user with sudo privileges

Step 1 – Update the system

The first step is to update the system packages

sudo apt update -y

Step 2 – Install Glances

Now let’s install Glances on our server

sudo apt install glances -y

As the installation completes, you can verify the Glances installation using

glances --version

You should see output similar to the following. The exact version numbers may differ:

Glances x.x.x with PsUtil x.x.x
Log file: /root/.local/share/glances/glances.log

Now lets check whether glances is working

sudo systemctl status glances

You should see the output as

● glances.service - Glances
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/glances.service; enabled; preset: enab>
     Active: active (running) since Thu 2026-08-27 10:39:47 EDT; 1min 44s ago
       Docs: man:glances(1)
             https://github.com/nicolargo/glances
   Main PID: 40994 (glances)
      Tasks: 1 (limit: 7047)
     Memory: 35.4M
        CPU: 416ms
     CGroup: /system.slice/glances.service
             └─40994 /usr/bin/python3 /usr/bin/glances -s -B 127.0.0.1

Aug 27 10:39:47 demoserver systemd[1]: Started glances.service - Glances.
lines 1-13/13 (END)

Step 3 – Launching Glances CLI

As Glances has been installed, you can check using the simple cli command

glances

and on the screen, you will get to see all the information related to your server.

Given below is what the color represents

• Green: Everything is fine.
• Blue: Caution.
• Purple: Warning.
• Red color: Critical.

The default threshold limit for all the parameters is given below

• careful=50
• warning=70
• critical=90

Step 4 – Changing threshold limits

In case you want to change the default threshold limit, you can edit the glances.conf file

sudo nano /etc/glances/glances.conf

Find the parameters given below in the file and set them according to your requirements.

[quicklook]
# Define CPU, MEM and SWAP thresholds in %
cpu_careful=50
cpu_warning=70
cpu_critical=90
mem_careful=50
mem_warning=70
mem_critical=90
swap_careful=50
swap_warning=70
swap_critical=90

Now save and close the file

Now lets restart glances for the changes to take effect

sudo systemctl restart glances

Conclusion

With this, we have successfully installed Glances on our Ubuntu 26.04 or Debian 13 Trixie.

Frequently asked questions

Does Glances have a web interface?

Yes. Glances includes a web server mode that can provide a browser-based interface. However, this tutorial focuses on using Glances through its terminal interface.

Is Glances available on Ubuntu and Debian?

Yes. Glances is available through the default package repositories on both Ubuntu 26.04 and Debian 13 (Trixie), so you can install it using the apt package manager.