Home Assistant Remote Access for FREE - DuckDNS + LetsEncrypt + Single URL

In this video I will show you step by step everything you need to know to get remote access working on your Home Assistant, from setting up a free domain name on DuckDNS to setting up a single seamless URL experience. We also discuss some other remote access solutions and other security considerations to be aware of.

Hardware to run Home Assistant:

If you'd like to support me and future projects:
Patreon:

Buy Me a Coffee:

Written Article:

EVERYWHERE YOU CAN FIND ME:
Everything Smart Home Community Discord:

#homeassistant #smarthome

00:00 Intro
01:08 Requirements
02:33 Remote access options
03:37 Quick overview of steps
04:22 DuckDNS domain name setup
05:04 Port Forwarding
07:14 DuckDNS Home Assistant install and setup
08:46 Certificates explained
09:40 Port forward validation
10:29 Single URL's explained
11:17 NAT Loopback explained
11:55 NAT Loopback Testing
12:31 DNSMasq add-on installation and configuration
13:55 DNSMasq validation and testing
14:37 Router DNS servers
15:00 Single URL Testing
15:43 Internal/external URL configuration change
16:13 Security considerations and checks
17:32 Enabling IP Ban
17:56 Outro

________________________

Some of the links above are affiliate links, where I earn a small commission if you click on the link and purchase an item. You are not obligated to do so, but it does help fund these videos in hopes of bringing value to you!

[tweebs]

You deserve an award for that marathon! Thanks,

[suzanneyates]

I spent HOURS trying to get this to work, using other YouTube videos, reading up documentation, and I kept hitting a brick wall. Thank you so much for explaining everything properly for dummies like me, you have made all of this stuff actually accessible. Hugely appreciated.

[tomekhekin]

YOU SO Just discovered you and I am so impressed. You are not only a greater teacher and clearly show step by step how to do everything but you are so got at front of the camera. This is so rare for tech savvy people. Keep up the good work.

[SamDukez]

You are the only one that has explained this so perfectly and didnt assume your viewers knew everything. So bravo for that. The changing to 8.8.8.8 on the duck dns is where i believe no other video has showed and is the cause of many people getting stuck. Thank you.

[SmartHomeMakers]

Gold mine of information! Particularly enjoying the security considerations part :)

[knetbafoon]

Thank you so much for this guide. I'm new to HA, it took me just an hour, then 3 days of pulling my hair out because I couldn't get it working, turns out my isp were blocking all my ports, a 10 minute call to them & BAM! Job done. Cheers.

[deanboock]

One of the few tutorials where everything was where it was meant to be. Great work!

[sebastien.]

Complete noob here, was struggling to get everything working and finally found your video, many thanks you're awesome !

[tryn]

Man, this was an amazing video! Thank you so much! Definitely subscribed for more! It's really clear that you've put effort into explaining this in a very clear way to people that has not done this for 20 years! Even if you have. That is truly commendable, and is definitely not an easy thing to do!

[AwesomeOpenSource]

Excellent explanation of all of this. No clue why anyone would give this a thumbs down. Great work, keep it up.

[JohnHight]

Wow! Thank you so much for this excellent tutorial. You have got me to the NAT Loopback, and you have armed me with enough to get to the single URL nirvana.

[paulmurrayphotography]

Lewis, this is an exceptional video. I've been using computers and working in this industry for over 40 years, I've trained thousands of people. Lewis, you have that skill of putting exverything together and explaining stuff in a simple, understandable way.

[chrisdunn]

Massive thanks for making something difficult and full of pitfalls so straightforward. It worked!

[MM-]

I hardly ever write comments when watching multiple "how to" videos on getting things working...BUT, you are absolutely the best! I watched someone else's video on how to set this up and I got locked out of my HA because the guy missed to mentioned some steps that you covered. very helpful and thanks for saving the day for me!

[kellanstevens]

Thanks so much for this video, it helped me find out I was on a CGNAT and a quick message to my ISP and they changed it so I have my own IP. I've been trying this for months but just that tiny snippet of the video when you talked about CGNAT helped so much! thanks so much

[andresdaza]

finally someone with pfsense and home assistant.many things to learn before this video. i was wondering to go back to wall manual switches and take home assistant to trash. i reaaly appreciate your video. all solved!

[TechTutorialsDavidMcKone]

A very well explained and informative solution, but I feel it carries too high a risk, despite the convenience
This is because it involves exposing an internal server to the Internet
Should it get hacked, it's then likely to be used to try to access other computers and as most folks will likely have a flat home network that means the attacker will have direct access to try and exploit other IT devices in the home
There is the possible extra step of placing the device in a DMZ, like businesses do, but home users won't have the extra IT security that goes with that strategy
It's relatively cheap to build your own VPN device these days and place it behind your firewall. And you can use free DDNS to deal with the problem of having a dynamic Public IP
As you said, a VPN is the more secure strategy but it's the only I'd consider myself
After a while you get used to opening the app when you're away
But throw in some signed certificates with a passphrase and it's much harder to exploit this, as long as you keep everything regularly patched of course
Plus you get the added benefit of more secure browsing on a public WiFi because your phone builds a secure VPN tunnel back to your home

[RLRTT]

Just watched this again after moving houses, countries and hardware, great video!

[geeves]

Hello! Would you consider doing one of your awesome tutorials for a non- hassio install (particularly for a Docker install)? Given there's no add-ons, I have spent the last 6 hours trying to configure it and cannot get an external HTTPS going. I originally followed this fantastic tutorial on a Raspi with Hassio but have upgraded and now running into walls :( Thank you for all your work!

[apriljohnson]

You always have a different way of solving every issue I have tried to solve by other means. Most other channels are doing the same things but you get there a different and more direct way. I am supposed to have a loopback router but apparently not. Now, it doesn't matter. Thank you!