Run global network tests instantly from your keyboard with Raycast and Globalping

Sarah Mischinger -

We’re happy to announce the official Globalping extension for Raycast! With it, you can run network measurement tests from virtually anywhere in the world – all without opening your browser, a new terminal window, or breaking your flow.

In this blog post, we’ll walk you through what the extension does, how to set it up, and a few tips and use cases to help you get the most out of it.

What the Globalping Raycast extension does

Let’s start by briefly introducing you to the two tools:

Globalping is an open-source network measurement platform that lets you run tests from thousands of probes around the globe. The Globalping team and community have also built integrations that let anybody run tests from where they need them, such as the terminal, VS Code, Slack, and now Raycast.

Raycast is a productivity launcher available for macOS and Windows. If you like keeping your hands on the keyboard, you will quickly understand Raycast’s appeal: it lets you perform many actions with a couple of keystrokes without using the mouse. You can install numerous extensions to customize your setup, such as GitHub, Notion, Spotify, and now Globalping.

Here’s what you can do with the Globalping extension:

  • Run all Globalping test types (ping, dns, http, traceroute, and mtr)
  • Run tests on one or more probes at once and filter them by continent, country, city, ASN, cloud provider, network type, and more
  • Receive formatted results in real time, directly in the Raycast UI
  • Re-run tests instantly
  • Create Raycast Quicklinks for your most used tests
  • Copy or share results via a publicly accessible link with others

Just like our other Globalping integrations, the extension is open source and available on GitHub.

If you’re a fan of tools that help you stay focused and keep your hands on your keyboard, we believe this extension could be a great fit for you.

Installing the extension

You can install the extension directly from the Raycast Store:

  1. Open Raycast and search for “Store”
  2. In the store, search for “Globalping” and hit enter to install

Authentication

The extension uses OAuth to connect to your Globalping Dashboard account, allowing you to increase your hourly test limit from 250 to 500 (at the time of writing) and spend any credits you may have on additional tests.

Authentication happens automatically the first time you open a Globalping command, prompting you to sign in or create a dashboard account.

Running your first test

Open Raycast and search for any available command, or type “Globalping” to see all available commands and choose one.

Let’s run a quick ping:

  1. Choose Globalping’s ping command in Raycast
  2. If this is your first test, define the default number of probes you want to test from (you can change this anytime in Raycast Settings > Globalping)
  3. Enter the target hostname or IP address
  4. Hit enter to run the test
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Keep in mind that each probe counts as one test. So when you run a ping from three probes, you use three tests.

The results should start appearing in a moment, showing relevant data including probe info, packet loss, and latency.

By default, the extension uses your most recently used location or defaults to world (random location) if you haven't run a test before. To pick a specific location, press ⌘L (macOS) or Ctrl+L (Windows) to open the location picker.

Tips

Keyboard shortcuts

These shortcuts are available to you out of the box:

  • ⌘R / CTRL+R: Re-run the current test
  • ⌘L / CTRL+L: Open the location picker
  • ⌘C / CTRL+C: Copy the primary result
  • ⌘S / CTRL+S: Create Raycast Quicklink

If you run specific tests regularly and don’t want to re-create them each time, you can save them as Raycast Quicklinks.

After running your desired test and viewing the results, press ⌘S / CTRL+S to create a Quicklink that reopens the same command with the same settings pre-filled.

Once saved, you can assign a hotkey to the Quicklink in Raycast Settings > Globalping, so you only need to press that hotkey to trigger the test.

Fine-tune locations

You can target probes using the following:

  • Continents and regions
  • Countries and US states
  • Cloud regions like aws-eu-west-1, gcp-europe-west3, or azure-eastus
  • Network types like eyeball (residential ISPs) or datacenter
  • ASNs or ISP names

You can use the + character to fine-tune location selection. For example, Germany+aws will target any probe in Germany hosted in the AWS network.

Example use cases

Finally, let’s explore some use cases where the Raycast Globalping extension can be handy.

Quick reachability check

If your API isn't responding and you’re not sure whether it’s a local issue, open Raycast and run a quick ping against one of your endpoints. For example, if there’s packet loss or high latency from locations other than yours, the problem probably isn’t just on your end.

Verify DNS propagation

Let’s say you have just updated a DNS record and want to know whether it’s already propagated globally. Instead of waiting and guessing, open the DNS command in Raycast, enter your domain, select the record type, and run some tests from different locations to quickly see where propagation is slow.

Debug regional latency

Imagine users in a specific region are experiencing slow load times, but everything looks fine on your end. To put yourself in your users' shoes, you’ll need to run tests from their location. Again, you can do that quickly in Raycast by running a test like mtr in the user region, without needing a server there.

Conclusion

The Globalping Raycast extension lets you run global network tests without leaving your keyboard. Whether you’re running a quick ping or setting up Quicklinks for regular tests, it’s fast and can feel like a natural part of your workflow, especially if you’re already using Raycast.

Try it out and see how it fits into your workflow.