Install httpstat with Homebrew, Nix, scoop

Project links

• Homepage

Commands and aliases

• httpstat

Project history

The GitHub repository was created in August 2016 by reorx and describes the tool as 'curl statistics made simple.' The README emphasizes a deliberately small shape: a single Python 3 script with no dependency, installable directly, through pip, or through Homebrew.

The early release trail shows rapid iteration in September and October 2016, with releases in the 1.1 and 1.2 series soon after publication. A later 1.3.0 release in October 2020 marks the project as more than a one-off gist: it kept the same curl-wrapper identity while continuing to package a small diagnostic utility for shell workflows.

Adoption history

httpstat spread through package-manager culture because it solved a common debugging need with almost no installation weight. The Homebrew formula, pip installation path, Nix package, and Scoop package listed in package metadata all reflect the same appeal: developers could add a readable latency breakdown to an existing terminal workflow without adopting a full monitoring stack.

The GitHub repository accumulated thousands of stars, and the README points users to related implementations in Go, including davecheney/httpstat and tcnksm/go-httpstat. That related-project list shows how the idea moved from a Python curl wrapper into language-specific tools and libraries.

How it is used

Typical use is `httpstat example.com` or `python httpstat.py example.com`. Because it wraps curl, users can pass many curl options after the URL, including HTTP method and data flags, while httpstat controls the timing output.

The README documents structured JSON and JSONL output, save-to-file support, SLO threshold checks, NO_COLOR handling, and environment variables such as HTTPSTAT_CURL_BIN for choosing a curl binary. That keeps it useful both for interactive diagnosis and for lightweight scripting.

Why package nerds care

httpstat is a neat package-nerd artifact because it turns curl's `-w` timing machinery into a memorable executable. It is small enough to install everywhere, visual enough to demo in one terminal screenshot, and close enough to curl that it does not need to own HTTP behavior itself.

It also sits in a family of 'make a primitive readable' CLI packages: curl already knew the timings, but httpstat made them glanceable. That is exactly the kind of tiny Unix-adjacent utility that package managers preserve well.

Timeline

• 2016: GitHub repository created for reorx/httpstat.
• 2016: 1.1 and 1.2 releases published soon after the public repository appeared.
• 2020: 1.3.0 release published.
• 2026: README documents JSON/JSONL output, SLO checks, NO_COLOR support, and related implementations.

Related projects

• curl is the underlying HTTP client and timing source for httpstat.
• davecheney/httpstat is the Go implementation recommended by the README for Windows users.
• tcnksm/go-httpstat is a Go library and CLI in the same timing-diagnostics family.
• httptap covers a similar phase-by-phase timing niche with a newer Python/Rich interface and additional TLS/request visualization.

Sources

• GitHub releases supply the 2016 and 2020 release timeline.
• GitHub repository metadata supplies the creation date, description, license, and popularity signal.
• Homebrew and package metadata support package-manager adoption.
• The README supplies the curl-wrapper design, installation paths, usage examples, environment variables, structured output, and related projects.