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What is AdGuard Home?

AdGuard Home filters ads and trackers at the DNS level, so one server protects every device on your network. You install it once, point your router at it and manage everything from a web page. Because it runs on your own hardware, you choose what is blocked and keep control of your network data.

AdGuard Home is a self-hosted DNS server that blocks ads and tracking for every device on a network, with no software needed on each device. It refuses to resolve known ad and tracker domains, so devices never connect to them. It also offers parental control, enforced safe search, encrypted DNS, a built-in DHCP server and per-device settings, all managed from a web interface.

Core capabilities

  • Block ads, trackers, phishing and malware domains for every device on the network, including smart TVs.
  • Choose your blocklists, add your own filtering rules and enforce parental control and safe search.
  • Use encrypted upstream DNS and serve DNS-over-HTTPS, DNS-over-TLS and DNS-over-QUIC yourself.

Blocking at the DNS level

AdGuard Home works as the DNS server for your network and refuses to resolve domains used for ads and tracking. This also covers devices where you cannot install an ad blocker, such as smart TVs, smart speakers and other connected devices. You choose which blocklists to use and can add your own filtering rules, and the web interface lets you monitor network activity. The project is clear about one limit: ads served from the same domain as the content, such as YouTube ads or sponsored social media posts, cannot be blocked this way.

  • DNS filtering
  • Blocklists
  • Custom rules
  • Smart devices

Family controls, devices and encrypted DNS

Built-in options block phishing and malware domains, block adult sites through parental control and force safe search on search engines. Persistent clients identify devices by IP address, CIDR range, MAC address or ClientID and give them their own settings, upstream DNS servers and tags. AdGuard Home can send queries upstream over DNS-over-HTTPS, DNS-over-TLS or DNSCrypt, and can itself serve DNS-over-HTTPS, DNS-over-TLS and DNS-over-QUIC. It also includes a DHCP server, access settings for who may use it and a REST API.

  • Parental control
  • Safe search
  • Per-client settings
  • DNS-over-HTTPS
  • DHCP

Install it on your own hardware

AdGuard Home is licensed under GPL-3.0 and runs on Linux, including Raspberry Pi, as well as macOS, Windows, FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD. It can be installed with an install script, from release archives, as an official Docker image or as a Snap package. On first start a setup wizard on port 3000 creates the admin account, and later updates can be applied from the web interface, which keeps a backup of the previous version. The project states that it collects no usage statistics and uses no web services unless you configure it to.

  • GPL-3.0
  • Docker
  • Raspberry Pi
  • Self-hosted

Where it fits

Use cases

  1. 01

    Block ads on every device at home or in the office

    Install AdGuard Home on an always-on machine such as a Raspberry Pi, then open the setup wizard on port 3000 to pick the network interface and create an admin user. Enter the server's address as the DNS server in your router's settings, so phones, laptops and smart TVs are filtered without extra apps. If the router does not allow custom DNS, let AdGuard Home act as the DHCP server instead.

  2. 02

    Give each device its own filtering

    Add a device as a persistent client under Settings, then Client settings, and identify it by IP address, CIDR range or MAC address. Choose which settings and upstream DNS servers apply to it, and give it tags. Custom rules written with ctag then apply only to the devices carrying that tag.

  3. 03

    Keep devices filtered away from home

    Point a domain name at a server with a public IP address and add a certificate, for example a free one from Let's Encrypt, in the Encryption settings. AdGuard Home then answers DNS-over-HTTPS, DNS-over-TLS and DNS-over-QUIC requests, so phones and laptops stay filtered on other networks. A ClientID in the address lets you tell those devices apart.