ethui is a native macOS desktop application that gives Ethereum smart-contract developers a visual command centre for local chain development — wiring together a test wallet, live transaction inspection, and deep integration with the Anvil local testnet in one focused window.
What is ethui?
ethui is a macOS-native development companion for EVM engineers: a graphical shell that wraps around a running Anvil node, manages test accounts, and surfaces chain state without sending you back to a terminal every thirty seconds to run cast call.
If you have shipped any Ethereum contract in the past few years, you know the ritual well. Spin up a local node, paste a private key into MetaMask, toggle networks in the browser extension, then squint at JSON terminal output to figure out what a transaction actually did. ethui collapses that fragmented loop into a single native window that feels at home on macOS rather than grafted onto it.
What does ethui do best?
The standout strength is the Anvil integration. Point ethui at a running Anvil instance and it picks up the pre-funded test accounts automatically — no manual key import, no copy-pasting hex strings. As your forge scripts or test suites move funds and call contracts, ethui updates balances and transaction history in real time. I have found this invaluable during debugging sessions: instead of hunting through terminal scroll-back for a revert reason, the failed call is right there in the transaction list.
The wallet layer is deliberately scoped to the development context. You can sign and broadcast transactions against the local node, switch between test accounts in a click, and watch nonces tick up as automated scripts run. It is not a MetaMask replacement and was never intended to be — this tool does not touch mainnet keys and should not.
Is ethui free?
Yes — ethui is free to download and is open-source. There is no paid tier, no telemetry paywall, and no feature gating. For a specialist tool aimed squarely at developers, that is exactly the right call.
Who should use ethui?
ethui is built for Solidity and EVM-chain engineers who have already adopted the Foundry toolchain. If your daily loop is forge test → anvil → cast, ethui slots in naturally as the visual read layer on top of that workflow. Developers who are new to Web3 and still parsing JSON receipts by hand will find the transaction and balance views genuinely instructive — seeing account state change in a native UI teaches you the underlying model faster than terminal output does.
Teams using Hardhat exclusively will find less immediate value. ethui's design centres on Anvil, and while some edges of the tool are network-agnostic, the friction of adapting a Hardhat workflow outweighs the benefit unless a Foundry migration is already on the roadmap.
What are the best ethui alternatives?
The longest-standing GUI competitor is Ganache, the Truffle Suite's desktop app. Ganache has broader name recognition and has been part of the Ethereum developer ecosystem for years, but Truffle itself has wound down and Ganache's Electron-era interface shows its age on modern Apple Silicon hardware. ethui's native macOS roots give it a noticeably crisper feel.
For teams comfortable staying entirely in the terminal, the Foundry CLI — forge, cast, and anvil — covers everything ethui exposes visually. If you can read a cast tx output without flinching, you may never feel the gap. Where ethui earns its keep is in pair-programming sessions, demos, or onboarding teammates who are not yet fluent in the Foundry CLI surface area.
Hardhat's built-in console and verbose logging remain the right choice if you are already invested in that ecosystem and not planning a switch.
