Tailscale for self-hosted AI dashboards

Prerequisites

• A self-hosted AI agent host (any OS Tailscale supports — Linux, macOS, Windows)
• A device you'll access the dashboard from (laptop, phone)
• A Tailscale account (free at tailscale.com)

Steps

1. Sign up for Tailscale

   Visit tailscale.com, sign up with Google/GitHub/Microsoft. The free tier covers 100 devices and 3 users — more than enough for personal use.

2. Install Tailscale on the agent host

   Use the official install script. Authorise the device when prompted.

   # Linux:
   curl -fsSL https://tailscale.com/install.sh | sh
   sudo tailscale up
   
   # macOS: download the app from the App Store, sign in.
   
   # Follow the auth URL printed by 'tailscale up'.

3. Find the agent host's Tailscale IP

   Every Tailscale device gets a stable 100.x.y.z address.

   tailscale ip -4

4. Install Tailscale on your laptop

   Same process. Use the same Tailscale account. Both devices are now on the same private network ('tailnet').

5. Access the dashboard

   Open http://<agent-tailscale-ip>:8765 (or whatever port your agent uses). Should work as if the host were on your local network.

6. Optional: Magic DNS for friendly URLs

   Tailscale Magic DNS lets you address devices by hostname instead of IP. Enable in the Tailscale admin console under DNS. Then you can access http://hermes-host.tailnet.ts.net:8765 instead of the IP.

Troubleshooting

Devices can't see each other

Check both devices are signed in to the same tailnet. ACLs may be restricting; check the admin console under Access Controls.

Auth URL doesn't open

On a headless server, copy the URL from the terminal and open it on a device with a browser. The auth flow doesn't require the auth to happen on the same machine.

Where to go from here

Configure Tailscale ACLs to restrict which devices can reach the agent host. Add Tailscale Funnel if you need to expose the dashboard to non-Tailscale users with HTTPS but without a public IP.