libuv is a cross-platform asynchronous I/O library that provides an abstraction layer for event-driven networking, filesystem operations, and system signals. It utilizes a non-blocking event loop to coordinate asynchronous tasks and I/O events across different operating systems.
The project features a unified interface for managing TCP, UDP, and DNS resolution, alongside an inter-process communication layer for sharing sockets via named pipes and Unix domain sockets. To prevent blocking the main execution loop, it includes a multi-platform thread pool for offloading computationally expensive work.
Beyond networking and threading, the library covers asynchronous filesystem access and real-time event monitoring. It also provides tools for child process management, system signal handling, and high-resolution timing for performance tracking.
Core capabilities are exposed to multiple programming languages through community-maintained bindings and wrappers.