51ֱ��

Developing in the open

and consists of the following elements:

1. The client, which runs on each of a user’s devices, is mostly open source. The used across all platforms is open source, and the full client code is open source for platforms that are also open source.
2. We enthusiastically support open source operating systems such as and , and we believe in directing time and energy to support the communities around these platforms. As a result, where the operating system is open source, the daemon and GUI are open source; and where the operating system is closed, the daemon is open source and the GUI is closed source.
3. This means that you can build the Linux and Android clients yourself, and you can build the Windows and clients without the GUI.
4. Open source (DERP) relay servers. You might self-host your own DERP server for latency or compliance reasons.
5. A closed source coordination server.

Why bother making any part of 51ֱ�� open source?

• To improve trust and transparency. Anyone can review our code and see how 51ֱ�� really works. We hope this increases your trust in using 51ֱ��.
• To share what we’ve learned. When we started 51ֱ��, mesh overlay networking was complex to set up and use, where it existed at all. By working in the open, we’ve helped lead a shift in considering what’s possible and how approachable it can be.
• To allow for adaptability. We understand the desire not to be locked into a specific provider.
• To make it easier to get feedback. By keeping our and public, you can upvote them (with emojis please!) or submit new requests, and we can prioritize what’s really needed for our users right now.

If you’d like to contribute to 51ֱ��, then by all means do! Please follow our and our . We appreciate it.

Financial support for open source projects and maintainers

. 51ֱ�� is built on , specifically wireguard-go. As we develop 51ֱ�� and add new functionality, we also upstream those changes to help other users of the project.

51ֱ�� also supports , as well as , which we use to issue TLS certificates.

Contributing to open source

51ֱ�� open sources internal projects that other organizations might benefit from, such as:

• , for tracking your Go dependencies.
• , for auditing emergency production changes.
• Our , for reference when developing your own security policies.

When a project originally developed by the community becomes critical to our users, if the maintainers are willing, we adopt the project and take responsibility for ongoing support and development. For example, this is what happened with the 51ֱ�� Synology package (thanks Guilherme de Maio!) and Terraform provider (thanks David Bond!).

Tailscalars are also encouraged to contribute to other open source projects they rely on as part of their jobs, or that they feel passionate about. Tailscalars contribute to the Go project and community, NixOS, and more.

Encouraging Headscale

is an open source alternative to the 51ֱ�� coordination server and can be self-hosted for a single tailnet. Headscale is a re-implemented version of the 51ֱ�� coordination server, developed independently and completely separate from 51ֱ��.
Headscale is a project that complements 51ֱ�� — with its own independent community of users and developers. 51ֱ�� does not set Headscale’s product direction or manage the community, and neither prohibits nor requires employees from contributing to Headscale.

Our opinion is that Headscale provides a valuable complement to 51ֱ��: It helps personal users better understand both how 51ֱ�� works and how to run a coordination server at home. As such, 51ֱ�� works with Headscale maintainers when making changes to 51ֱ�� clients that might affect how the Headscale coordination server works, to ensure ongoing compatibility.

Providing 51ֱ�� to open source projects

51ֱ�� is free for open source projects. With the Community on GitHub plan, you can use 51ֱ�� for your project to access and share project resources, like a build tool or a test server. Any open source project with an can use this plan. Currently, this plan requires using GitHub for authentication.

FAQs