Complete Self-Hosting Guide: Pangolin & Authentik (2025)
In today’s fast-paced digital environment, where control over your data and infrastructure is becoming increasingly vital, self-hosting has emerged as a transformative solution. This guide delves into leveraging Pangolin og Authentik to create a secure, scalable, and centralized self-hosting environment. With a focus on professionals, IT teams, and developers managing business-critical systems, this comprehensive explanation will help you master infrastructure setup for complete data ownership and security.
Whether you’re migrating away from third-party providers or setting up an optimized environment to run applications, this guide covers all the essentials – from reverse proxy configurations to unified identity management.
Why Self-Hosting? The Three Pillars of Digital Ownership
The video emphasizes three critical motivations for self-hosting:
- Complete Data Ownership
By hosting your applications on your own servers or trusted cloud solutions, you ensure full control over your data and reduce reliance on third-party services. - Enhanced Security
Self-hosting enables you to build a robust infrastructure with protective measures like firewalls, encrypted tunnels, and advanced monitoring tools, reducing exposure to vulnerabilities. - Unified User Access
Using tools such as Authentik, you can streamline user management while ensuring secure and centralized access to applications, regardless of their location.
By employing Pangolin og Authentik, you can seamlessly address these goals. Pangolin serves as a robust reverse proxy and secure tunnel, while Authentik provides an identity management system for unified access control.
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Step-by-Step Guide to Setting Up Pangolin and Authentik
1. Choosing Your Hosting Environment
You can either:
- Use on-premises hardware (e.g., a repurposed desktop or server).
- Leverage cloud-based infrastructure. The video highlights Hetzner as a reliable, high-performance cloud provider with fair pricing.
For this guide, the focus is on deploying the architecture in Hetzner’s environment. A robust setup includes:
- Two servers: One for the Pangolin reverse proxy and one for hosting applications.
- A private subnet to isolate server communication securely.
2. Setting Up Pangolin: Your Reverse Proxy and Secure Tunnel
What is Pangolin?
Pangolin is an open-source alternative to commercial proxy and tunnel systems like Cloudflare. It allows secure routing of traffic to your self-hosted applications while ensuring data privacy.
Installation Process:
- Prepare Your DNS Records:
- Register a dedicated domain for your applications.
- Add three DNS records:
- A root domain (
@), pointing to your reverse proxy server’s IP. - A wildcard subdomain (
*), allowing dynamic subdomains for applications. - A subdomain for the Pangolin dashboard (
proxy.yourdomain.com).
- A root domain (
- Install Pangolin:
- Use the provided installation script to deploy Pangolin as a Docker container.
- Assign a wildcard SSL certificate for secure connections.
- Set Up Firewalls:
- Limit open ports to HTTP (80), HTTPS (443), and SSH (22).
- Use a private subnet to allow secure communication between servers.
- Enable CrowdSec for Cybersecurity:
- Integrate CrowdSec, an open-source solution that offers intrusion detection and protection against malicious activity.
- Add collections or rules specific to your applications (e.g., WordPress protection).
Key Benefits:
- Full control of reverse proxy configurations.
- Elimination of reliance on external services like Cloudflare.
- Advanced security with integrated CrowdSec.
3. Deploying Authentik: Unified Identity Provider
What is Authentik?
Authentik is an open-source identity provider that simplifies user authentication for self-hosted applications. It supports OAuth2, SAML, and LDAP, making it compatible with almost all enterprise systems.
Installation Process:
- Clone the Docker Repository:
- Use the provided Git repository to download pre-configured Docker Compose files for Authentik.
- Customize the Docker Compose file to match your server’s private network and ports.
- Configure Database and SMTP Settings:
- Set up PostgreSQL as the backend database for Authentik.
- Enter SMTP credentials for email notifications (e.g., user invitations, password resets).
- Deploy Authentik:
- Run Docker Compose to launch Authentik in the private network.
- Access the initial setup page to create an admin account and configure the system.
- Integrate with Pangolin:
- Add Authentik as a resource in the Pangolin dashboard.
- Route traffic to Authentik using its assigned subdomain (e.g.,
idp.yourdomain.com).
Key Features:
- Centralized user management for self-hosted applications.
- Support for external identity providers (e.g., Microsoft Entra, Google Workspace).
- Scalable licensing for businesses, offering a cost-effective solution.
4. Optimizing Your Environment
Persistent Connections:
- Konfigurer Systemd services to ensure that Pangolin’s tunnel automatically reconnects after server reboots.
Security Best Practices:
- Disable root access and password-based authentication on servers.
- Use SSH keys for secure server access.
- Add two-factor authentication (2FA) and security keys for Authentik admin accounts.
Backup Strategies:
- Enable automated backups for servers.
- Sync application data to additional volumes or external storage solutions.
Key Takeaways
- Pangolin offers a self-hosted alternative to Cloudflare for reverse proxy and secure tunneling, ensuring data ownership.
- Authentik provides centralized identity management, simplifying access control for self-hosted applications.
- Leveraging a private subnet og firewalls minimizes cybersecurity risks.
- CrowdSec integration ensures around-the-clock protection from malicious traffic.
- Use Hetzner’s cloud servers or other reliable infrastructure providers for cost-effective performance and scalability.
- Regular backups and robust security practices (e.g., SSH keys, 2FA) are essential for maintaining a secure hosting environment.
Conclusion
Self-hosting with tools like Pangolin and Authentik represents a significant step toward achieving autonomy and control over your digital assets. By following the steps outlined above, you can create a secure, scalable, and unified infrastructure to host mission-critical applications. This guide provides the foundation for a transformative journey into self-hosting, empowering you to take back control of your data and minimize reliance on external providers.
Explore the possibilities of what self-hosting can unlock for your business or personal projects. With the right architecture and tools, the future of digital sovereignty is at your fingertips.
Source: "🔥🔥 Definitive Self-Hosting Guide (2025) 🔥🔥 | Secure, Efficient Self-Hosting for the Future" – Webnestify, YouTube, Aug 26, 2025 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTyq9xGy1pM
Use: Embedded for reference. Brief quotes used for commentary/review.
