# Tailscale Tailscale is a zero-trust mesh VPN built on WireGuard. Unlike traditional VPNs that route all traffic through a central server, Tailscale creates direct encrypted connections between devices. This means traffic between your laptop and a server goes point-to-point rather than through a bottleneck, resulting in lower latency and better performance. The setup is remarkably simple: install the client, authenticate with your identity provider (Google, Microsoft, GitHub, etc.), and your devices can immediately see each other on a private network. Tailscale handles NAT traversal, firewall punching, and key management automatically. Access control happens through identity-based policies rather than IP addresses, letting you define rules like "developers can access staging servers" instead of managing IP allowlists. Common use cases include secure remote access to home or office resources, connecting cloud infrastructure across providers, accessing self-hosted services without exposing ports to the internet, and linking IoT/edge devices. It replaces the complexity of traditional VPNs, bastion hosts, and port forwarding with a single overlay network that works everywhere. ## Related - [[Virtual Private Network (VPN)]] - [[WireGuard]] - [[NetBird]] - [[ZeroTier]] - [[Zero Trust Security]] - [[Self-hosting]] ## References - https://tailscale.com/