Self-hosted blog - do I need a static IP address?
hi everyone,
I was just about to self-host a Ghost blog but then was warned that my ISP might change my external IP address at any time, so I would need to pay for a static IP address.
Is that true?
(I'd not seen much about that in stuff I've looked up so far about self hosting)
As others have said, you can use dynamic DNS, but you also might have an IPv6 address that doesn’t change. Or maybe it does, you’ll have to check with your ISP. But that one can be set up as an AAAA record in your DNS.
Most ISPs support IPv6, but some don’t, so you might not be accessible to everyone without also having an A record.
I recommend afraid.org, you get everything that you need for free dynamic dns, and they're a cool project so someday you may like to do even more with them or send them a little donation.
I started with noip first, and the monthly re-up was so annoying.
Seconded. Used their service for many years.
They are excellent
Whether your ip changes frequently depends on your ISP, but it's not necessary to have a static ip. My public IP changes about once a year, but I use my router to update my dns and make ally external services rely on DNS and not IP to connect.
You can also do this, look up "dynamic DNS". You just need to register a DNS name (can be free) and set up the updates to make it accurate.
I selfhost my blog without a static IP. You just need Dynamic DNS.
Keep in mind that your outbound bandwidth might be different from your inbound. I get 300mbps in, but only 5mbps out. It's not noticeable during normal Internet use, but as you start sharing content publicly, limited bandwidth becomes really noticeable.
You can rent a virtual private server (VPS). I used to have a number of these for under $10 / month. I imagine they might cost more now., but chances are you can still find something super affordable.
Wordpress.org will let you have a free site but you don't get a custom domain. Wordpress.com has a personal plan for $4 / month. Matt Mullenweg (CEO) has revealed himself to be a crazy piece of shit, so maybe look elsewhere. I'm just trying to give you a sense of how accessible this stuff can be.
Running a VPS will require more learning, but it can be super gratifying if you enjoy nerdy computer stuff and solving puzzles just for self-satisfaction. I used to use Rackspace, Linode, and something else that I can't recall at the moment. All were pretty reasonable. Rackspace had a ton of good setup guides for newbies that were well written. I'd occasionally land on those doing a web search for other hosting stuff and found them reliable.
Edit: DigitalOcean was the one I couldn't remember.
https://www.hetzner.com/european-cloud Netzner can be a good alternative
As others have already commented, what you need is a Dynamic DNS service, where you register a subdomain, and setup a small program or script on your computer that pings the DDNS server every few minutes, that way you leave that running on the background, and if the program detects that the IP with the request changes, it will update the subdomain to point to it automatically.
You could access the blog from the subdomain of the DDNS directly or if you get your own domain, you can point it to the DDNS.
If you want a recommendation, I have been using DuckDNS for years, and it has been pretty reliable.
There’s also FreeDNS. Their only ask is that you log into the account once every 6 months so they know you’re still using it.
It makes things easier, but you have options, such as:
I could make this quick: Is your internet access behind a CG-NAT? If yes: you're gonna need a static IP.
Not necessarily, Cloudflare tunnels, headscale/tailscale will sort that issue out amongst several other ways
I was going to use Cloudflare to sort this, but I'm uncomfortable how big they are getting / lack of competition in that part of the market. So we looked at Pangolin as an alternative, but it's a faff to self host.
Hence why we're back at exposing it straight out the back of Nginx Proxy Manager.
But how will a tailnet help for a blog? At some point, the https port needs to be open.
My router says it has NAT enabled (in the WAN settings section - for the internet connection)
It's not about your router. But rather if your ISP connects several households with the same IP.
You don't need one, but it does make things easier.
What you can use is something like Dynamic DNS to update your DNS record if your IP ever changes.
I would stand up a VPS in a cloud provider
Personally I would look at using a tunnel, something like Cloudflare tunnels (easy to setup, sorts dns out) but many here dislike Cloudflare for a lot of reasons. However the free plan allows you to get started, easily, and then once you are started and serving your blog you can look into other solutions, or failing that stay on Cloudflare. Other tunnels exist but if you have a domain, using cloudflare is the easiest imho to get started
Thank you for your replies everyone!
I'm looking into DDNS. Before I go with a provider, I notice that my router has this functionality built in. Should I use that?
(It's an Asus RT-AX86U Pro - so fairly chunky in terms of spec)
For reference, the set up is:
Docker containers for
(It's an Asus RT-AX86U Pro - so fairly chunky in terms of spec)
I have your exact router make and model! I self host my own server with a domain on my home network and make use of the built in DDNS feature.
My domain registrar is Cloudflare so I have to use a custom script for DDNS, if you’re in the same boat I can provide the script.
I would suggest looking into Asus WRT Merlin Firmware, the custom firmware enables more functionality to your router.
Docker containers for
- Ghost
- Nginx Proxy Manager
When hosting a reverse proxy like Nginx, Traefik, SWAG, Pangolin, etc keep in mind you 80:80 and 443:443 ports need to be exposed to the host machine then you will forward those ports on your router. This will allow your reverse proxy to communicate with Lets Encrypt generating and verifying your SSL certificates.
Regarding Lets Encrypt your server doesn't need to be accessible from the internet if you use the DNS-01 challenge. Caddy with the caddy-dns plugin for your provider can do that automatically for you.
Running a service like ddclient may give you more options at the cost of being more complicated.
Surprised nobody has mentioned cloudflare ddns. If you registered your domain with cloudflare, you can use the api or qdm12’s (author of gluetun) ddns-updater to keep your A/AAAA records up to date.
@Paddy66 it depends.
I host everything, including website and email server behind a regular dynamic ip for years.
And no I don't get block by any gafam.
But I am lucky because my ISP doesn't change that often (maybe twice a year). And my domain provider provides an API that my ISP router can use to update my IP automatically.
It may work, it may not :)
Did you have any problem with sent mails not being accepted by big ones like gmail?
@curry after i setup everyrthing I had no deliverability issue. But i had to use an external SMTP relay because of my isp filtering traffic on port 25. That adds an extra fixed IP layer that may provide a better IP reputation idk. I rent a cheap 1.2€/month vps for that purpose.
I get listed in spamhaus because of a dynamic IP, but my relay isn't listed (at least not in not scam blocklist). Anyway I send mail, to gafam or whatever and people reply back.
I send 2-3 mails a week, maybe it counts.
Some of the other options are cloud flare tunnel or ddns that would give you static ip effect without static ip
No, you don't. Use Tailscale to expose your blog.
YunoHost has automatic DNS updates
https://doc.yunohost.org/admin/tutorials/domains/dns_dynamicip/
there is Onionshare...
I used tailscale and lightsail VPS from India. https://hsps.in/post/how-i-host-public-apps-using-tailscale/
I just use github pages tbh. Free
Kind of depends on how you want to access it, and how you want others to access it.
How are you hosting? And do you have a domain? Lot's of good advice here, but knowing if you're running on a Pi, in Docker, etc, would help others give you the easiest/best method.
In short, you do not need a static IP.
Hi, I'm using Docker - one container for Ghost and one for Nginx Proxy Manager.
I've decided to go with DDNS but am having trouble choosing a reliable free provider. I've seen Dynu.com recommended but that is not available in the dropdown list of servers in my router's section on DDNS. Is that relevant?
Or would I just ignore the router settings and set it up some other way?
Cloudflare is a good choice. I used DNSExit for a while, and also NS1, but settled on Cloudflare. You don't have to use their proxying, just DNS.
Here's a Docker Compose for you that will set myhost.mydomain.com to point to your public IP of wherever it is run:
dyndns-cloudflare:
image: oznu/cloudflare-ddns
container_name: dyndns-cloudflare
environment:
- API_KEY=<key>
- ZONE=mydomain.com
- SUBDOMAIN=myhost
- PROXIED=false
restart: unless-stopped
I'm having a good experience with cloudflare, using ddclient on a cron job
To clarify: it doesn't matter much what your router supports if you have a server with ddclient (possibly in Docker container). Then you can choose whatever provider you'd like, and there are tons of resources on ddclient.
You can use a ddns such as duckdns or host on github pages with jekyll or something
Cloudflare Tunnel is a good fit to your use case. You only need a domain name to expose your web server via Cloudflare.
https://developers.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-one/connections/connect-networks/
You could also put it on a cloud system and not worry about your local connection.
You come to a post on SELFHOSTED@lemmy.world... And downvote everyone posting relevant discussion then post "USE CLOUD".
You can self host services on cloud servers.
You only need a static address for hosting email or VoIP.
You can do just about everything else with DDNS (dynamic DNS). However with DDNS, you will have downtime until the DDNS update takes effect and propagates to clients. This can be seconds... or hours. Depends on the DDNS service and TTLs that they set and how quickly your script/DDNS client works to push the update out.
You should check how often your address changes and check how quickly your DDNS solution pushed the update out. If it's 10 seconds every 10 months, you will likely find that perfectly acceptable. If it's an hour every other sunday... maybe not. But only you will know how much downtime you can tolerate.
I always will take static IP personally. But it's not technically required and you can work around it if you want to save the 10-15$/month.
Edit: You could also argo tunnel if you're okay using cloudflare. But I don't think that answer is particularly in scope of the question. But just in case it's useful to someone out there I'm adding this edit. Doesn't fix the PTR requirement for Email and VoIP stuff though.
I run an smtp relay exactly for that kind of stuff with emails. Clients still like wordpress and this is easy to use, many other will accept an smtp relay/service like say gmail (the first one I could think of)
Yeah that's another option as well... Services like dynu.com or smtp2go.com do exist... but you have to pay for them and there is a risk that the service can open/read your messages.
Email works fine with non-static IP addresses. I suspect VoIP does too.
No it does not. You need an active PTR record for email to work for most of the major carriers (Gmail, O365, etc...). Many providers will just outright block consumer IP ranges as well.
You cannot host an email server on dynamic addresses.
Edit: And you've edited in the VoIP part of your comment... Same thing there, you need PTR and such for those services to work well... Which generally can't be assigned to dynamic addresses.
"works fine" as in you can pretend it works, but you will get filtered by any larger email provider.