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Honest comparison · Updated for 2026

Looking for a Remote Access Alternative?

ngrok, Nabu Casa, Cloudflare Tunnel, Tailscale, DuckDNS — they all solve remote access differently, and each is genuinely good at something. Here is where Pluggie fits, written plainly so you can pick the right one even if it is not us.

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Free forever tier · No email or credit card required

The short version

Where Pluggie actually differs

Not cheaper for the sake of it — different in four specific ways that matter if you self-host.

Your own domain

Run your service on your domain, pointed with a simple CNAME — no DNS transfer, no vendor subdomain you cannot change. Included on paid plans from $6/month.

Geo and IP filtering built in

Limit access by country or IP range from the dashboard, with HTTP Basic Auth on top. No WAF rules to write, no separate product to configure.

Not just Home Assistant

Install as a Home Assistant app or as a plain Docker container on any Linux box, then tunnel whatever sits behind it — NAS, cameras, Grafana, Nextcloud.

A free tier with no email

Create an account without handing over an email address or a card, get a pluggie.net subdomain and 1 GB per 30 days, and decide afterwards whether it earns your money.

Side by side

How the options compare

Same data we publish on our homepage. Where a competitor is stronger, we say so.

Prices are fixed per currency, not converted — you are charged exactly the amount shown.

  Pluggie ngrok Nabu Casa Cloudflare Tunnel Tailscale
Price Free / $6 mo Free / $10 mo $6.50 /mo Free Free / $8 user mo
Free tier ✓ Data-limited ✓ $5 credit, then stops 31-day trial only ✓ ✓ (6 users)
No email signup ✓ (free tier) * × × × × (SSO required)
End-to-end encryption ✓ ** × (TLS at edge) ✓ ** × (TLS at edge) ✓ (WireGuard)
Encryption integrity check ✓ Active status in UI × (no E2E) Manual fingerprint only × (no E2E) ✓ (built into VPN)
Built-in geo/IP filtering ✓ Via Traffic Policy (paid) × Via WAF rules × (ACL only)
Custom domain ✓ (paid plans) × ($20 plan + hourly) ✓ (via CNAME) ✓ (requires CF DNS) × (MagicDNS only)
Free subdomain ✓ pluggie.net ✓ ngrok-free.app ✓ nabu.casa × (temporary only) ✓ tailnet domain
Docker & Home Assistant ✓ Both Agent binary, no HA add-on Home Assistant only ✓ ✓
Setup complexity ~5 min ~2 min ~5 min ~15 min ~10 min

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* Free tier needs no email or credit card. Paid plans use Stripe, which requires an email at checkout.

** How each service handles encryption:

  • Pluggie & Nabu Casa — certificates are generated on your device and relayed through a proxy that never decrypts traffic. With any relay service the provider controls the domain and could in principle issue alternative certificates; Nabu Casa has openly acknowledged this. Pluggie shows live integrity status in the dashboard, Home Assistant sidebar and Docker UI; Nabu Casa offers manual fingerprint comparison, but has not yet implemented the automatic CT audit they have been exploring.
  • ngrok & Cloudflare Tunnel — TLS terminates at their edge, so traffic is decrypted there. ngrok's free tier also serves an interstitial page before your content.
  • Tailscale — WireGuard end-to-end, but needs a client on every accessing device.
Straight talk

When you should pick something else

Choose ngrok if…

You are exposing a local port for a few hours at a time — testing webhooks, demoing a branch, debugging a callback. Its traffic inspector and request replay are better than anything we offer, and for short sessions the pricing works in your favour. It also tunnels raw TCP and TLS, which we do not. Pluggie is built for the opposite shape: a service that stays online, on your own domain, at a flat price. ngrok bills $0.02 per active endpoint hour, so anything left running around the clock costs roughly $14 a month before you add a custom domain.

Choose Nabu Casa if…

You run Home Assistant and want your subscription to fund its development directly. That is a real and legitimate reason, and the integration is first-party. Pluggie is a different trust model only in the details, not in kind.

Choose Cloudflare Tunnel if…

Budget is the binding constraint and you are comfortable with your DNS living at Cloudflare and TLS terminating at their edge. It is free and it works well at scale.

Choose Tailscale if…

You want a private mesh network between your own devices rather than a public HTTPS URL, and you do not mind installing a client on everything that needs access. For device-to-device access it is excellent.

Choose a self-hosted tunnel if…

You want to run the relay yourself. To be clear about what Pluggie is: it is a hosted service, not self-hosted software. You run the agent on your own hardware and your services never leave your machine, but the relay and the pluggie.net domain are ours. If you want to own that layer too, look at frp, rathole, sish or boringproxy on a VPS you control — you trade setup and upkeep for the guarantee that nobody else operates any part of the path. If your reason is trust rather than control, the relevant detail is that certificates are generated on your device, our relay never decrypts your traffic, and the integrity status is visible live in the dashboard; we wrote up exactly what we can and cannot see in Can Pluggie see your traffic?

Choose Pluggie if…

You want a plain HTTPS URL that works in any browser, on your own domain, with geographic and IP filtering included — and you are behind CGNAT or simply do not want to open ports. Also if you want to try it without handing over an email address first.

Questions

Common questions when switching

Both use a similar trust model: certificates are generated on your device and the relay forwards encrypted traffic without decrypting it. The practical differences are that Pluggie supports custom domains, includes geographic and IP range filtering, shows live encryption integrity status, runs on plain Docker as well as Home Assistant, and offers a free tier that needs no email address. Nabu Casa directly funds Home Assistant development, which is a legitimate reason to choose it.
If it runs permanently, probably yes. ngrok charges $0.02 per active endpoint hour, so a tunnel that stays up around the clock costs roughly $14 a month, and a custom domain needs the $20 Pay-as-you-go plan plus an hourly domain charge on top. Pluggie is a flat $6 a month with your own domain included — whether you are exposing Home Assistant, a NAS, Grafana, a webhook endpoint or a self-hosted app. If you only bring the tunnel up occasionally, ngrok's free tier may still be cheaper, and we would rather say so than sell you something you do not need.
SSL certificates are generated and stored on your own device, and our relay servers forward encrypted traffic without decrypting or storing it. Pluggie continuously verifies the integrity of that encrypted connection and shows the status in the web dashboard, the Home Assistant app sidebar and the Docker local UI. To be straight with you: with any relay-based service the provider theoretically controls the domain and could issue alternative certificates. That is exactly why the integrity indicator exists — so you can see if anything ever looks wrong. Nabu Casa uses the same architecture and offers a manual fingerprint comparison instead. Cloudflare Tunnel terminates TLS at their edge, so traffic is decrypted there. Tailscale uses WireGuard end-to-end but requires a client on every accessing device.
It is free and genuinely capable, so if budget is the deciding factor it is a reasonable choice. The trade-offs are that TLS terminates at Cloudflare's edge servers, so your traffic is decrypted there; using a custom domain requires moving your DNS to Cloudflare; and access filtering is configured through WAF rules rather than in the product. Pluggie keeps certificates on your device and includes geographic and IP filtering directly.
Tailscale is a WireGuard mesh VPN and is excellent at that job. The difference is architectural: every device that needs access must run the Tailscale client and sign in through SSO. Pluggie exposes a normal HTTPS URL, so you can open your service in any browser — including on a device you do not control — without installing anything.
DuckDNS only maps a name to your changing IP address. You still forward ports, which exposes your network to inbound scans, you still manage certificates yourself, and none of it works if your ISP puts you behind CGNAT. Pluggie needs no inbound ports, works behind CGNAT, and issues and renews certificates automatically.
Yes, on paid plans. Point your domain at Pluggie with a CNAME — no DNS transfer required, so your registrar and nameservers stay where they are. Let's Encrypt certificates are issued automatically and managed on your device. The free tier uses a pluggie.net subdomain.
Yes. The free tier includes one tunnel with 1 GB at full speed per 30 days and a free pluggie.net subdomain, with no email address and no credit card required. After the cap the tunnel keeps working at 128 Kbps until the next reset. Custom domains and more bandwidth are on paid plans from $6/month.
No, and you do not have to commit. Pluggie runs alongside whatever you use today — install the Home Assistant app or Docker container, paste your key, and test it on the free tier before changing anything. If it does not suit you, delete the tunnel and nothing else was touched.

Try it alongside what you already use

Free tier, no email, no card. Five minutes to find out if it fits.

Comparing against one product in particular? There is a longer write-up on Pluggie as an ngrok alternative.

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