Tailscale without root

Tailscale without root.md

title	subtitle	author	date	lang	description	keywords
How to run Tailscale without root	**Longing to connect to your lab server?**	_Mitanshu Sukhwani_	`2025-06-07`	en	Learn how to set up and run Tailscale in user-space without root access. Includes steps for downloading static binaries, configuring tailscaled with a custom socket and port, automating startup via cron, and troubleshooting multi-user setups.	Tailscale, user-space networking, tailscaled, cron job, Linux, static binaries, multi-user setup

Get tailscale

1. Fetch appropriate binaries for your architecture from here: Tailscale Packages - stable track

2. Untar using:

tar xvf tailscale_*.tgz

3. Rename folder:

mv tailscale_*/ tailscale/

4. Add folder to path & alias by appending the following lines in ~/.bashrc:

export PATH="$HOME/tailscale:$PATH"
alias tailscale='tailscale --socket=$HOME/tailscale/tailscaled.sock'

With Systemd (Recommended)

0. Create the systemd user config directory:

mkdir -p ~/.config/systemd/user/

1. Create a service file using:

nano ~/.config/systemd/user/tailscaled.service

2. With the following contents:

[Unit]
Description=Tailscale node agent
Documentation=https://tailscale.com/kb/
Wants=network-pre.target
After=network-pre.target NetworkManager.service systemd-resolved.service

[Service]
ExecStart=%h/tailscale/tailscaled --state=%h/tailscale/tailscaled.state --socket=%h/tailscale/tailscaled.sock -tun=userspace-networking --port=41641
ExecStopPost=%h/tailscale/tailscaled --cleanup

Restart=always
RestartSec=5

StandardOutput=append:%h/tailscale/tailscaled.log
StandardError=append:%h/tailscale/tailscaled.log

[Install]
WantedBy=default.target

%h redirects to $HOME variable.

3. Reload daemon, start & enable the service, and check the status:

systemctl --user daemon-reload
systemctl --user enable --now tailscaled.service
systemctl --user status tailscaled.service

4. Run the client with:

tailscale --socket=$HOME/tailscale/tailscaled.sock up

5. Log in and profit!

Without Systemd (Hacky)

1. Create a bash script

nano $HOME/tailscale/start_tailscaled.sh

2. With the following contents:

#!/bin/bash

# Path to the tailscaled binary
TAILSCALED_START="$HOME/tailscale/tailscaled --state=$HOME/tailscale/tailscaled.state --socket=$HOME/tailscale/tailscaled.sock -tun=userspace-networking --port=41641"
TAILSCALED_CLEAN="$HOME/tailscale/tailscaled --cleanup"

# Function to check if tailscaled is running
is_running() {
    pgrep -x tailscaled > /dev/null
}

# Start tailscaled if not running
if ! is_running; then
    date
    echo "Starting tailscaled..."
    nohup $TAILSCALED_CLEAN >> $HOME/tailscale/tailscaled.log 2>&1 &
    nohup $TAILSCALED_START >> $HOME/tailscale/tailscaled.log 2>&1 &
else
    date
    echo "tailscaled is already running."
fi

4. Modify the crontab via

crontab -e

5. With

@reboot $HOME/tailscale/start_tailscaled.sh
* * * * * $HOME/tailscale/start_tailscaled.sh

5. Run tailscale using:

tailscale --socket=$HOME/tailscale/tailscaled.sock up

6. Login using the url shown and enjoy!

Bonus:

If multiple people are using Tailscale without root, change to a free port and modify the following in your systemd.service/bash.script:

1. from

--port=41641

to

--port=41642

2. Only in bash script:

from

pgrep -x tailscaled

to

pgrep -f 41642