Home BYOD
Closed Beta

Bring your own device.

Use a Linux machine you already own — a spare laptop, a homelab box, a Raspberry Pi sitting in a drawer — and have a website running on your computer in minutes with Dargo. No upfront cost.

$0 Upfront
500 MB Free / month
~5 min From setup to live

What is BYOD?

BYOD — Bring Your Own Device — is the other way to run Dargo. Instead of buying our preconfigured hardware, you install the Dargo system on a Linux machine you already own. The portal at my.dargo.net sees your machine the same way it sees a Dargo device: you install apps from the AppStore, point a domain at your apps, and Dargo handles tunnels, certs, and updates.

BYOD is currently in closed beta — applicants are reviewed manually and approved invitees receive an invitation code by email. The application form is short.

How it compares

The BYOD pricing model below is permanent — it doesn't change between closed beta, future open beta, or general availability.

  • No upfront cost — no hardware to buy, no monthly fee
  • 1 free BYOD slot on every BYOD-only account, forever. Need more devices on the same account? Additional slots are $19 one-time each — pay once, that slot is yours
  • Hardware owners get unlimited free BYOD slots on top of their device — no $19 fee
  • 500 MB / month of free traffic per device. Past that: $0.40 / GB (drops to $0.25 / GB above 2 TB) — top up to stay online
  • If your balance hits zero, the device pauses until you top up. (This is different from hardware, which throttles instead of pausing — hardware never goes offline.)

Quick start — get a site live in minutes

Apply for closed beta

Submit the short form at my.dargo.net/welcome?apply=1. We review applications manually; you'll get an invitation code by email when approved (usually within 24 hours).

Sign up + claim your account

Use the code in the email to sign up at my.dargo.net. The portal walks you through adding your first BYOD device.

Run the install command on your Linux box

The portal generates a single-line install command unique to your device. Paste it into a terminal:

curl -fsSL https://install.dargo.net/install/<your-token> | sudo bash

This installs Docker, the Dargo agent, and starts the service. Takes about a minute on most boxes.

Pick an app from the AppStore

Back in the portal, browse 65+ open-source apps — Ghost, WordPress, Nextcloud, Discourse, and more — and hit install. Pick a free *.mydargo.com subdomain or point a custom domain at it. Certs are auto-issued. Your site is live.

System requirements

Dargo's BYOD agent currently runs on Linux only. Below is what works today + how to get there if you're on macOS or Windows.

Native

Linux (x86_64 or arm64)

Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, Arch, Raspberry Pi OS, Alpine — any modern distro with systemd and Docker support works. Both 64-bit Intel/AMD and ARM (Raspberry Pi 4 / 5, Apple silicon under Linux, etc.) are supported.

Run the install command from step 3 above. That's it.

Windows

Windows · use WSL

Windows itself isn't supported, but Windows Subsystem for Linux is — install WSL with Ubuntu, then run the install command inside WSL. From an elevated PowerShell:

wsl --install -d Ubuntu

Open the new Ubuntu terminal, then run the dargo install command exactly as you would on a Linux box.

macOS

macOS · use a VM

macOS isn't supported directly. Spin up a small Linux VM and install Dargo inside it. Free options:

  • Multipass — Canonical's one-command Ubuntu VM
  • OrbStack — fast macOS-native Linux VMs
  • UTM — open-source emulator built on QEMU

Inside the VM, run the install command as you would on any Linux box.

Hardware sizing — what's "enough"?

Dargo doesn't need much. Typical resource use per app:

  • CPU: 1 core is fine for a personal site; 2+ cores recommended if you plan to run several apps in parallel
  • RAM: 2 GB minimum, 4 GB+ recommended (each app runs in its own Docker container)
  • Disk: 16 GB+ — most apps + data fit comfortably under that; storage-heavy apps like Nextcloud or PhotoPrism want more
  • Network: outbound HTTPS only (the agent connects out to our tunnel server). You do not need a public IP, port forwarding, or any router configuration.

How it stays secure

  • No open ports. Traffic flows through an outbound tunnel from your box to our edge — you never expose a port on your home router. Your home IP is never visible to visitors.
  • Auto-issued certs. Every app gets a valid HTTPS certificate, refreshed automatically. Custom domain or subdomain — both work.
  • Your data, your box. Apps run in Docker on your machine. We don't store your app data; only routing metadata + traffic billing live on our side.

Ready to try BYOD?

Apply for closed beta — we review applications manually and reply by email. Have an invitation code already? Sign up below.

Apply for Closed Beta Sign in

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