ZeroTier — Your Global Network Switch

Imagine all your devices — cloud servers, your home laptop, your phone at a café — are on the same local network. No complex VPN setup, no port forwarding hassle. That's exactly what ZeroTier offers — a project with 15.7k stars on GitHub.

Why Developers Love ZeroTier?

Working on distributed systems, I've often faced this problem: how to securely connect services scattered across different locations? Traditional VPNs often turn out to be too cumbersome. ZeroTier solves this problem elegantly and simply.

How Does It Work?

ZeroTier creates a virtual Ethernet switch of planetary scale. All connected devices receive:

• Automatic peer-to-peer connection (when possible)
• End-to-end traffic encryption
• Local IP addresses in a unified address space
• Fine-grained access control rules configuration

Technically, this is implemented through:

1. VL1 — P2P network with cryptographic node identification
2. VL2 — virtual Ethernet layer with SDN capabilities

5 Reasons to Try ZeroTier Right Now

1. Easy setup — install the client and enter the Network ID — that's it
2. Cross-platform — Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android, even embedded systems
3. Security — E2E encryption and network-level access control
4. Flexibility — use a cloud controller or deploy your own
5. Performance — traffic goes directly between nodes when possible

# Пример подключения к сети после установки клиента
sudo zerotier-cli join 8056c2e21c000001

Where Does It Come in Handy in Practice?

Here are a few scenarios from my practice:

• Microservices development — all components see each other as if on a local network
• Remote work — secure access to office resources without corporate VPN
• Game servers — easy to set up and connect to a friend's server
• IoT projects — managing devices in different locations as one network

Technical Details for the Curious

• Written in C++ with elements of Rust (for OIDC)
• Supports Prometheus metrics for monitoring
• Includes built-in HTTP server for hosting SPA applications
• Works even behind symmetric NAT (with limitations)

# Пример конфигурации Prometheus для мониторинга ZeroTier - job_name: zerotier-one metrics_path: /metrics static_configs: - targets: ['localhost:9993']

Is It Worth Trying?

If you:

• Develop distributed systems
• Manage infrastructure across multiple locations
• Want to simplify access to your home or office network
• Are looking for an alternative to traditional VPNs

...then ZeroTier definitely deserves your attention. An open-source project (BSL 1.1), with an active community and an impressive 10-year history.

Links to get started:

• Official website
• Documentation
• Source code

P.S. When setting up ZeroTier for the first time, I was surprised by how much simpler it was than I expected. Have you tried it yet?