Tailscale vs WireGuard
WireGuard is the free protocol; Tailscale is a managed service built on it that handles keys, sign-in and device discovery.
Pick Tailscale if…
You want devices to find and connect to each other with sign-in, access rules and little setup, and a free plan for up to 6 personal users is enough.
Pick WireGuard if…
You want the bare protocol, full control, no account with a vendor, and are fine managing keys and config files yourself.
Price
- Freemium
- Open source
- Free
- Open source
Starting price
Free plan
Open source
Works on
| Feature | A mesh VPN built on WireGuard that links your devices into a private network with sign-in based access. | A free, open-source VPN protocol and set of tools for building encrypted tunnels between devices. |
|---|---|---|
| Price |
|
|
| Starting price | $8 per user per month (Standard) | — |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Open source | Yes | Yes |
| Works on | Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android | Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android |
| Try Tailscale (opens the Tailscale website in a new tab) | Try WireGuard (opens the WireGuard website in a new tab) |
WireGuard is a VPN protocol and set of tools: you configure an interface with your private key and your peers' public keys. It costs nothing, and its components are under licences such as GPL-2.0, MIT and Apache-2.0 depending on the repo.
Tailscale says it uses the open-source WireGuard protocol for encrypted point-to-point connections and builds a mesh network, called a tailnet, with identity-based access. Its clients are BSD-3-Clause on GitHub, but its hosted coordination server is closed source; Headscale is a community-maintained alternative that Tailscale does not manage.
Tailscale pricing: Personal is $0 with up to 6 users and unlimited user devices, for non-commercial use only; Standard is $8 and Premium is $18 per user per month. WireGuard has no plans or prices.
In short, Tailscale trades some self-hosting control for convenience. WireGuard gives you the building block; you handle key distribution, addressing and any user management.
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Last updated 17 October 2026. How we make money