Tailscale

What hackers pick instead

• HeadscaleFree open source self-hosted control server compatible with Tailscale clients, giving full control over your network, though it is not a complete drop-in replacement and can be finicky to set up.79recommend
• ZeroTierPeople recommend it as a free-tier mesh network that links devices across the internet without exposing them publicly. Critics report slow performance and occasional instability.19recommend
• Tailscale Peer RelaysLets Tailscale devices relay traffic for peers behind difficult NAT, improving speed and reliability without running separate DERP servers.15recommend
• OpenZitiOpen-source, identity-based overlay network that lets you host services without open listening ports and set granular access per client; critics cite hard-to-use UX and incomplete desktop and mobile clients.10recommend
• TelaFree userspace tool linking machines over WebDAV without TUN adapters, root or admin rights, plus hole punching for P2P speed.10recommend

Every quote

The 40 most detailed of 1346 comments. Each links to the original.

1. trimming is a neat feature - thanks for that - thought the ACLs are often not there to begin with because configuring off the full node level access defaults of the vpn is difficult, at least at scale.

   Mixed · Oct 2026 · in “Tailworm – Tailscale Vulnerabilities”

2. you're going to receive orders of magnitude less malicious traffic on a server accessible only over Tailscale compared to a server listening on the public Internet

   Mixed · Aug 2026 · in “Internet centralization and the original sin of NAT”

3. Tailscale has a bunch of nice features like Let's Encrypt integration, OAuth support, Tailscale SSH, etc. that make the experience quite nice overall

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

4. Through Tailscale I’ve accessed my main Mac from both the opposite coast of the US and from the other side of the Pacific and it works great.

   Recommends · Jul 2026 · in “Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future”

5. It has excellent built-in NAT traversal (almost always peer to peer via hole punching etc., with relay nodes only when everything else fails)

   Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Ask HN: Any real OpenClaw (Clawd Bot/Molt Bot) users? What's your experience?”

6. Tailscale dramatically reduces this risk, because I can so easily configure it so my own devices can talk to my home server from anywhere

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

7. there is a lot of convenience in the NAT traversal that you otherwise need router config and/or a publically routable server to achieve

   Recommends · Dec 2025 · in “VPN location claims don't match real traffic exits”

8. All of my self hosted services sit on my local network with access provided by Tailscale. I navigate to the address and they just work.

   Recommends · Jul 2026 · in “TS-2026-009: Insecure argument handling in Tailscale SSH permitted root access”

9. You can then set your DNS in Tailscale to that machines tailnet IP and access your servers when away without having to open any ports.

   Recommends · Mar 2026 · in “My Homelab Setup”

10. I migrated my raw Wireguard setup to Tailscale because after a few months without any tinkering I simply forget details of my setup.

    Recommends · Sep 2026 · in “Making Tailscale Faster”

11. It punches holes so I don't have to, even makes DNS work for my tailnet in a way I've never been able to get to work the way I want

    Recommends · Jan 2026 · in “IPv6 just turned 30 and still hasn't taken over the world”

12. Running some music streaming and photo server on an old laptop at home that I access via tailscale has proved surprisingly smooth.

    Recommends · Apr 2026 · in “Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers”

13. For me, (1) and (2) in particular make it a huge value add over managing Wireguard setup, configs, and firewall rules manually.

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

14. Most people set up something like Tailscale to accomplish something rather than create a project and ongoing maintenance burden

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

15. I run all my apps on my desktop and access them over tailscale. All web apps and I install on phones as PWAs. Super ergonomic.

    Recommends · Aug 2026 · in “Extensible Software in the Age of LLMs”

16. just accept that your grand total of 1 concurrent user on an intranet is probably just better served by setting up Tailscale

    Recommends · Apr 2026 · in “Protect Your Shed”

17. it's pretty easy and it ensures that only my phone, my main mac, and my homelab have access to each other and nothing else

    Recommends · Sep 2026 · in “Show HN: Share your AI Setup, Learn from others”

18. BUT, serveradmin.familydomain.com (another app on the same host) will ALSO be accessible to them (from a networking POV)

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

19. being able to install TailScale on your TV and then using your exit node in another country is a really nice convenience

    Recommends · Jul 2026 · in “Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'”

20. Trust a third party like Tailscale by giving them the key to your kingdom, but everything is incredibly easy and secure.

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

21. the NAT busting it does, which has so far worked flawlessly for me with no setup aside from installing on both devices

    Recommends · Jul 2026 · in “TS-2026-009: Insecure argument handling in Tailscale SSH permitted root access”

22. tailscale means you can safely deploy them without worrying about hardening the app and server from the outside world

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

23. they are adding a third party node that routes traffic for them (just to provide multiplexing), so in terms of security, it's an additional unnecessary man in the middle

    Criticizes · Aug 2026 · in “Internet centralization and the original sin of NAT”

24. Tailscale or Headscale (the self-hosted version) are massively overengineered for something as basic as accessing your Linux ISOs from your phone.

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

25. Tailscale is a security tool and yet the guys at Tailscale seem to be insistent on dumping everything INCLUDING the kitchen sink into it

    Criticizes · Jul 2026 · in “Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion”

26. Tailscale is responsible for designing a system whose convenient defaults allowed a stolen credential to have a very large blast radius.

    Criticizes · Jul 2026 · in “Tailscale didn't stop the Hugging Face intrusion”

27. some of their clients are closed source and proprietary, and thus totally controlled by them and the official distribution channels

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Tailscale Peer Relays is now generally available”

28. they seem to completely not support making ACL rules based on the identity of the device rather than a part of the address space

    Criticizes · Apr 2026 · in “I Am Building a Cloud”

29. Another concern I have is whether a compromise of Tailscale's own infra could let an attacker just add itself to my network.

    Criticizes · Jul 2026 · in “TS-2026-009: Insecure argument handling in Tailscale SSH permitted root access”

30. The new ACL cap seems strictly worse than before. Otherwise it seems the new free plan is mostly the same as the old Personal Plus plan for most users.

    Mixed · Apr 2026 · in “Tailscale's Pricing v4”

31. With terminal emulators, tailscale, local and remote agents, there's never been so much computing capability accessible from your pocket before.

    Mixed · Sep 2026 · in “iPhone Duo”

32. It uses Wireguard for a self-hosted VPN solution, but it also provides its own public IP addresses for your devices within the VPN cluster.

    Recommends · Jun 2026 · in “Ask HN: What are all the ways to punch through NAT?”

33. Mix in tailscale and I can control it from anywhere, on any device, with full transferrability using established and battle proven tooling.

    Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Claude Code Remote Control”

34. Its annoying that a security benefit is being turned off, but it can be turned back on if you are confident it will not break your setup.

    Mixed · Jan 2026 · in “Tailscale state file encryption no longer enabled by default”

35. Yes there's client logging by default, but those who are privacy conscious probably also continued to read the very next few sentences

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

36. which has let me easily spin up second (and third!) copy of each repo without having to worry about them interfering with each other

    Recommends · May 2026 · in “Show HN: Using Tailscale with an OrbStack VM on macOS”

37. Tailscale will keep your connection over a downstream switch, for example. It will not go through the router if it doesn't have to.

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

38. you'd need an exploitable attack on wireguard or one of tailscale's modifications to it and an exploitable service on your network

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

39. despite “holding the line,” already reveals the cracks when things like GitHub accounts have to be treated differently from others

    Mixed · Sep 2026 · in “SAML: A fractal of bad design”

40. I really like Tailscale. Recently though I've been having some hard-to-diagnose slowdowns even on a direct (non DERP) connection.

    Mixed · Feb 2026 · in “Tailscale Peer Relays is now generally available”