Tailscale: A Surprisingly Useful VPN Alternative

2025-03-05

The author shares their experience with Tailscale, a VPN alternative. Frustrated by CGNAT blocking port forwarding for remote access to a Raspberry Pi, they turned to Tailscale. It successfully solved the problem, creating a virtual private network that allows easy access to devices using simple domain names. Beyond this, Tailscale offers unexpected benefits: effortless file transfer between devices (Taildrop), exposing laptop ports for mobile web app testing, and the ability to function as a VPN with exit nodes, even integrating with Mullvad for enhanced privacy. The author uses the free tier and recommends the open-source server implementation Headscale.

Development