How do I get iowait on Linux?

If you don’t have the “iostat” command available, you’d want to install the “sysstat” package — on Ubuntu, often this is done with the command “apt-get install sysstat” and on Centos, this can be done with “yum install sysstat”. The exact command that I recommend would be “iostat -mxy 10” — then wait 10 seconds.

What is Linux iowait?

iowait is simply a form of idle time when nothing could be scheduled. The value may or may not be useful in indicating a performance problem, but it does tell the user that the system is idle and could have taken more work.