Some folks have a lot of devices, and some folks do not. Those of us who have one, two, or 10 computers constantly running can do a lot with Tailscale’s free plan to help out our friends and family. We can make their lives a little easier, free them from cloud dependency, and maybe even get them curious about this little app that makes everything feel like it’s on a local network.
Here are a few ways you can use Tailscale to share files, apps and streams, and even printers, if you’re into that sort of thing, presented in roughly increasing order of complexity.
Show them how Taildrop works
Let’s start with something really simple. Taildrop lets you, the savvy Tailscale user, send files between devices. Unlike that other well-known “drop” service, it does not require an Apple-provided operating system or permissions settings that leave you open to weird file requests in public spaces.
Show your friends or family how Tailscale lets you fling a PDF from a MacBook to an Android phone, or a folder full of photos from a Windows desktop to a Chromebook. Read up on our Taildrop docs to see how file picking, sending, and receiving work on different platforms.
Was that a bit too easy? Give them a glimpse into the deeper end with Taildrive. Taildrive provides persistent WebDAV folders, accessible only on your tailnet. It’s great for getting back to your Mac (or PC) to grab files or sync your work.
Become the VPN provider for your inner circle
If you have an always-on device running Tailscale, you can set it up as an exit node, then share that node to the Tailscale accounts of people you trust. Whenever they are next in need of a bit more privacy and security, or a U.S.-based location while they’re traveling, you can be their friendly VPN provider.
The easiest way to do this is with an Apple TV, a device that is easy to set up and hides well in an entertainment console. With the right configuration, the little box stays awake and uses small amounts of power. We have a guide to setting up your Apple TV as an exit node. Once set up, share that Apple TV node with other people’s Tailscale accounts. Alternatively, you can invite them to your Tailnet, but keep in mind that a free Personal account only has 3 users (Personal Plus has room for 6 users, your own little hockey team).
Is this a free privacy solution? No. Tailscale never sees your data (or anybody’s data, for that matter). But anyone using an exit node needs to trust the owner, and consider the existence of standard logging tools. It’s a trust exercise between you and any friends using your node that you have no inclination to sniff through their traffic (and probably better things to do).
Be the hero who puts up with a printer
You can use Tailscale to access a printer—or anything on your home network, really—while you’re away from it. Typically, you do this by making one of your Tailscale-connected devices a subnet router. You can then share that subnet-routing node with other Tailscale users by sending them an invite to make them of the users of your tailnet. It's different from how exit nodes work, because subnet routers cannot be shared through node-sharing.
Once someone joins as a user on your tailnet, they can use their system’s printer-finding tools to add your printer. Getting AirPrint to work from an iOS device over Tailscale is messy, but doable.
As with most things networking, there is a potentially more rewarding, more complicated way to do this.
I own the Brother laser that a lot of people own, the one that is so reasonably capable and boring it caused a Verge editor to post a meta/ironic/SEO/AI “review” of it. My version of this printer hates staying online through its own network interface, so I disabled it. I hooked up the printer’s USB cable to a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W (using a USB-A to USB-micro adapter), found a guide to setting up a Raspberry Pi as a CUPS printer server, and then installed Tailscale on that little Pi Zero 2 W (using the all-in-one Linux command).
The result is a node named "printer," one I can share to other Tailscale users, allowing people to print out event tickets and other paper they expect me to physically deliver. What a neat hack!
(Photo by ajay_suresh/Wikimedia, CC by 2.0)
Become a low-key file cloud for friends
Using Tailscale Serve, and some command-line effort, you can set up a very basic file server, one that lets people pluck files from a basic web page list of links. Only the people with shared access to that device can see and grab the files.
Be warned, though—it’s a slippery slope. Once you serve up a list of files, you’re dangerously close to whipping up a basic HTML page for your friends. After that, you’re putting whole ports of your device on your tailnet, making it easy to access services like Plex, Jellyfin, or the like. Before you know it, you’ll be setting up dedicated self-hosting devices and dreaming of being free of the cloud.
Share self-hosted web apps
If you have a network-attached-storage (NAS) device or any other computer you leave powered on, it can probably run Docker. If it can run Docker, it can serve up any number of useful, small web services. You can give other people access to these services in a few different ways:
If there’s nothing particularly sensitive on the hosting device, you can share the whole device (with Tailscale installed at a system level) to their Tailscale account, then let them know which addresses and ports they can access from their browser, like 100.xx.yyy.zzz:1234. Not the most elegant solution, but it works, especially if you have a number of ports to offer up.
It’s a bit easier on your audience to combine Docker containers and Tailscale (video version). That gives you one tailnet node per app, and gives your friends one share to accept and one URL to bookmark. You can go further with Tailscale Serve to create a secure, HTTPS-enabled address that won’t make certain browsers angry. Once you’ve got the knack for containers, you can upgrade that basic file server we mentioned in the last section, using File Browser, a NextCloud install with Files, or any number of folder-minded apps.
You can dig in deeper by sharing your service with more folks, no Tailnet necessary. Tailscale Funnel creates one-off, publicly accessible routes from your Tailnet to the wider internet, with a useful, HTTPS-enabled URL. If you’ve got more than one app to share, YouTube host Alex ran down how you can use a reverse proxy tool like Caddy to share self-hosted apps with the web, through your own domain. All of those options require caution and care, however, as they expose that device outside of Tailscale’s encrypted environs and put you in charge of access security.
How are you using Tailscale to help out your less-tail-aware friends and family? Tell us about it on Reddit, Bluesky, Mastodon, or LinkedIn.
Kevin Purdy
