Avahi is a system which enables programs to publish and discover services and hosts running on a local network.

For example, a user can plug a computer into a network and have Avahi automatically advertise the network services running on its machine, facilitating user access to those services.

Avahi implements the Apple Zeroconf specification, mDNS, DNS-SD and RFC 3927/IPv4LL.

Development on "FlexMDNS" started in late 2004, and work on the original "Avahi" began in early 2004.

The name Avahi is the Malagasy native name and scientific Latin name of a genus of woolly lemur, a family of primates indigenous to Madagascar.