Hexi – Modern header-only network binary serialisation for C++
Over the last few years, I've needed an easy way to quickly serialise and deserialise various network protocols safely and efficiently. Most of the libraries that existed at the time were either quite heavy, had less than stellar performance, or were an abstraction level above what I was looking for. I decided to put together my own class to do the job, starting with an easy, low-overhead way to move bytes in and out of arbitrary buffers. Along the way, it picked up useful bits and pieces, such as buffer structures and allocators that made the byte shuffling faster, often being able to do it…
Hexi – Modern header-only network binary serialisation for C++ launched on March 28, 2025 with 118 votes, #374 of 7,215 launches that month and more than 95% of that year's launches. The site was still online in September 2026, 1 year on.
In plain words
Hexi is a header-only C++ library for serializing and deserializing network protocols. It provides low-overhead byte manipulation with optimized buffer structures and allocators that minimize memory allocations and copies. The library includes safety features to prevent vulnerabilities and crashes from malicious or malformed packet data. It is designed for developers who need efficient, lightweight network protocol handling without the overhead of heavier existing solutions.
written from the facts on this page · September 2026
From the sources
Header-only, lightweight C++ library for binary streaming & serialization. Network data handling made easy peasy! - EmberEmu/Hexi
Hexi is a lightweight, header-only C++23 library for safely handling binary data from arbitrary sources (but primarily network data). It sits somewhere between manually memcpying bytes from network buffers and full-blown serialisation libraries. Some of the protocols Hexi is used to handle include DNS , STUN , NAT Port Mapping Protocol , Port Control Protocol , World of Warcraft (emulators) and GameSpy (emulators). Of course, nothing stops you from defining your own! The design goals are ease of use, safety when dealing with untrusted data and in the face of programmer mistakes, a reasonable level of flexibility, and keeping overhead to a minimum. What Hexi doesn't offer: versioning,…from github.com
In the maker’s words, at launch
Over the last few years, I've needed an easy way to quickly serialise and deserialise various network protocols safely and efficiently. Most of the libraries that existed at the time were either quite heavy, had less than stellar performance, or were an abstraction level above what I was looking for. I decided to put…
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