Pangolin

What hackers pick instead

• HAProxyFast, stable load balancer and proxy that people use for TLS termination, HTTP load balancing and fronting self-hosted services.24recommend
• Nginx Proxy ManagerA web-based reverse proxy that people recommend for its easy GUI setup, TLS/SSL certificate handling and wildcard certs. No caveat recurs among the quotes.10recommend

Every quote

The 40 most detailed of 54 comments. Each links to the original.

1. Pangolin handles this nicely. You can define alias addresses for internal resources and keep the fully private and off the public internet.

   Recommends · Mar 2026 · in “My Homelab Setup”

2. public services terminate on a disposable VPS and reverse-tunnel home only where needed

   Recommends · Aug 2026 · in “My Homelab Got Hacked – A Postmortem”

3. Been using it for a month or so to replace my Cloudflare tunnels and it's been perfect.

   Recommends · Mar 2026 · in “My Homelab Setup”

4. I replaced CF tunnels, which kept disconnecting every few minutes with it, and happy.

   Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

5. Reverse proxying to a VPS in Sydney with Pangolin achieved much better performance

   Recommends · Jan 2026 · in “Starlink users must opt out of all browsing data being used to train xAI models”

6. Pangolin is a good solution to this because you can optionally self-host it

   Recommends · Mar 2026 · in “My Homelab Setup”

7. Traditional reverse proxies require a public IP and open firewall ports.

   Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

8. was the missing piece I needed, to not expose my servers to the internet

   Recommends · Oct 2026 · in “What I self-host”

9. Pangolin is a great alternative to Cloudflare tunnels.

   Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

10. so I don't have to expose my home IP to the interwebs

    Recommends · Oct 2026 · in “Ask HN: What do you run on a $5 VPS that's worth keeping online 24/7?”

11. Can be fully self-hosted. Also based on WireGuard.

    Recommends · Mar 2026 · in “My Homelab Setup”

12. It beats exposing your home network directly

    Recommends · Oct 2026 · in “Ask HN: What do you run on a $5 VPS that's worth keeping online 24/7?”

13. Set up was easy and I never had any issues.

    Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

14. It's like self-hosted Cloudflare Tunnels

    Recommends · Nov 2025 · in “Cloudflare Global Network experiencing issues”

15. fully self-hostable open source

    Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

16. The main site also advertises "Self Host: Enterprise Edition" as being "100% Open Source" which is simply not true and false advertising.

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

17. enterprise edition seems to be falsly advertised on the main site as open source

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

18. which is simply not true and false advertising

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

19. a straight-up ripoff in the worst possible way

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

20. My only concern is I have a feeling that in few years it will “discontinue” the open source or community version

    Mixed · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

21. it seems focused on client-to-site (newt) connections, and I don't see support for client-to-client connections

    Mixed · Feb 2026 · in “Netbird a German Tailscale alternative (P2P WireGuard-based overlay network)”

22. A self-hosted vpn to bridge consumer isp and public networks I can put on a vps, is a lot easier to trust.

    Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

23. You could replace it with something better, like pangolin, either their cloud or even self host it too

    Recommends · Jul 2026 · in “Hardcore IndieWeb: Run your own website 100% independently for only $0.01/day”

24. Also a very good alternative. I went on a spree and tried out all of the self hostable alternatives

    Recommends · Sep 2026 · in “Cloudflare Quick Tunnels”

25. Some people run pangolin or nginx proxy manager on a cheap vps if it suits their use case

    Mixed · Dec 2025 · in “I got hacked: My Hetzner server started mining Monero”

26. impressive how much you've built and the usage you've attained in a short period of time

    Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

27. the process to get HA for Pangolin now feels within reach for the home lab

    Recommends · Sep 2026

28. switched over to Pangolin for access most of my self-hosted services

    Recommends · Dec 2025 · in “Self-hosting my photos with Immich”

29. The real solution is using something like Pangolin or Tailscale

    Recommends · Aug 2026 · in “I close SSH port 22 (and what I use instead)”

30. Pangolin VPS for forwarding and auth to stuff on my mini PCs.

    Recommends · Oct 2026 · in “Ask HN: What do you run on a $5 VPS that's worth keeping online 24/7?”

31. Pangolin would have been a better direct fit than Authentik.

    Recommends · Jun 2026 · in “Ask HN: What are tools you have made for yourself since the advent of AI”

32. You can do Tailscale like access using things like Pangolin

    Recommends · Jan 2026 · in “2026 is the Year of Self-hosting”

33. You could replace it with something better, like pangolin

    Recommends · Jul 2026 · in “Hardcore IndieWeb: Run your own website 100% independently for only $0.01/day”

34. weren't some feature gated behind the cloud version?

    Mixed · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

35. Pangolin as a secured gateway to my homelab services

    Recommends · Oct 2026 · in “Ask HN: What do you run on a $5 VPS that's worth keeping online 24/7?”

36. you can use immich behind pangolin/reverse proxy

    Mixed · Jul 2026 · in “Ente – Opening Our Books”

37. The resource-centric approach is the right call.

    Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Show HN: Pangolin: Open-source identity-based VPN (Twingate/Zscaler alternative)”

38. I personally use Pangolin, which is similar

    Recommends · Dec 2025 · in “Unifi Travel Router”

39. I already do the former (using Pangolin).

    Recommends · Jan 2026 · in “2026 is the Year of Self-hosting”

40. been using it for a while and it’s great

    Recommends · Sep 2026 · in “Cloudflare Quick Tunnels”