In my long and arduous journey to find a DNS server that meets my requirements:
Fast
Secure
Seamless
Doesn’t break
Is still supported
Can be used network-wide
I keep coming back to Pihole. I have tried almost every single DNS resolver I could find. My favorite three (and the only ones I can recommend) are AdGuard Home, NextDNS, and the almighty Pihole.
I am finally ready to settle down and commit to using Pihole as my main DNS resolver. In order to be sure of this, I have also decided to immerse myself into the “full ecosystem” if you will. Currently I am self-hosting Pihole on my Proxmox server (more about that in another post). I am using it as a DHCP server as well as a DNS server.
It really only takes a few minutes to set up Pihole. The developers have made a super simple script that runs an installer with a nice little GUI. During installation you can choose to log queries, use different upstream DNS resolver, choose to use the basic ad-blocker, and hide or show client IP addresses. With a fresh install I always use the default settings.
After installation I get to customizing by changing the blocklists, adding my own regex whitelist and blacklist entries, by enabling the DHCP server and reserving my static internal IP addresses.
How does Pihole stack up against the competition? Why did I decide to use Pihole as the spine for my home network? It really comes down to some key differences, features, and performance metrics.
I decided to make a little chart of my mental (and actual hard data) rankings of these three DNS resolvers. I should explain that I have a 1200 mbps fiber internet plan from Xfinity. As you can see in the first and second columns, Pihole is able to take the most advantage of that gig speed plan. The Adblocker test I use is from D3ward on GitHub. With Pihole and NextDNS I consistently was able to block all ads that were thrown at it. With AdGuard Home, I was sometimes able to block 100% but I mostly ended up with some ads leaking through (hence the 99% rating). The last column is a bit squishy since I rate this based on how the internet feels to me. As a whole, using the internet with Pihole feels like a fluid and instant experience. AdGuard Home seemed to work well however, there were oftentimes pauses or slowness in connectivity, snags in resolving, and as a DHCP server, AdGuard Home was not very good.
It really all comes down to personal preference. I have tried ‘em all and decided that I like the customizability of Pihole, the snappiness (even if it is just perceived and not actually measured) of resolving, and the DHCP server feature.
I have compiled some useful information about my Pihole configuration on my GitHub page. Make sure to check that repo out!
Thanks all!
Joe