Exploring Network Status

This section shows how to use the nmcli command line tool to examine the status of NetworkManager’s connections and devices.

Show the status of devices known to NetworkManager:

$ nmcli d
nmcli d
DEVICE           TYPE      STATE      CONNECTION         
enp0s31f6        ethernet  connected  Wired connection 1 
docker0          bridge    connected  docker0            
lo               loopback  unmanaged  --                 

Add --help for more details on a given option.

To show the current status of each of NetworkManager’s connections:

$ nmcli c
NAME                UUID                                  TYPE      DEVICE          
Wired connection 1  59b3aab1-f9a8-3bee-8fd2-2497a1dcd99c  ethernet  enp0s31f6       
docker0             b13e1f13-c23c-47c3-9b3e-ca43ecd79e79  bridge    docker0         

Finally, we can see the state of radio interfaces, including WiFi and WWAN (cellular) with the radio argument:

$ nmcli r
WIFI-HW  WIFI     WWAN-HW  WWAN    
enabled  enabled  enabled  enabled 

It is important to make sure that WiFi/WWAN radios are enabled so the respective connection types can establish a connection (we will specify how to this in following sections). As with the other commands, “–help” shows usage information.

Observe NetworkManage activity (changes in connectivity state, devices or connection properties):

$ nmcli monitor

See nmcli connection monitor and nmcli device monitor to watch for changes in certain connections or devices.