Skip to content

Tailscale

Tailscale is a zero-config VPN that makes your devices accessible from anywhere in the world.

Description

It builds a secure WireGuard-based mesh network between your devices, even behind firewalls and NATs.

When to use it

  • When you need a secure, zero-config VPN to connect devices across different networks and firewalls.
  • For accessing home lab services or remote servers without exposing them to the public internet.
  • To establish a secure mesh network for team collaboration or CI/CD pipelines.

When not to use it

  • If your environment requires a strictly hardware-based VPN solution with no third-party coordination server (though you can use Headscale as an open-source alternative).
  • For extremely high-throughput site-to-site links where dedicated leased lines or high-end hardware routers are more appropriate.

Getting started

Installation

On most Linux distributions, you can install Tailscale with a single command:

curl -fsSL https://tailscale.com/install.sh | sh

After installation, authenticate the device:

sudo tailscale up

Hello World

  1. Install Tailscale on two different devices (e.g., your laptop and your phone).
  2. Run tailscale status on your laptop to see your phone listed with its Tailscale IP.
  3. Ping your phone using its Tailscale IP: tailscale ping <phone-ip>.
  4. You have now established a secure connection between your devices!

CLI examples

The tailscale command is used to manage the local node and view network status.

# Check the status of your tailnet and connected peers
tailscale status

# Get the Tailscale IP address of the current machine
tailscale ip -4

# Check network connectivity and find the nearest DERP relay
tailscale netcheck

API examples

Tailscale provides a REST API (v2) for tailnet administration. You can use OAuth clients to generate access tokens.

# Generate an access token using OAuth credentials
curl -d "client_id=YOUR_CLIENT_ID" -d "client_secret=YOUR_CLIENT_SECRET" \
  "https://api.tailscale.com/api/v2/oauth/token"

# List all devices in your tailnet
curl -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_ACCESS_TOKEN" \
  "https://api.tailscale.com/api/v2/tailnet/example.com/devices"

Backlog

  • Setup Tailscale Exit Node on TrueNAS SCALE.
  • Configure MagicDNS for easy service access.

Contribution Metadata

  • Confidence: high
  • Last reviewed: 2026-06-12

Sources / References

  • https://tailscale.com/
  • https://www.zerotier.com/
  • https://www.netmaker.io/
  • https://tailscale.com/docs/install/linux
  • https://tailscale.com/docs/reference/tailscale-cli
  • https://tailscale.com/docs/reference/tailscale-api