Pi-hole

Health v2 · maintenance only

Flags: no_license

Adoption not part of the score

61062 stars · 3321 forks observed · 2026-09-25

What it is AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, 2026-09-21, confidence 0.99

Pi-hole is an open‑source DNS sinkhole that blocks advertising and tracking domains for every device on a network. It runs on modest Linux hardware or in Docker and provides a web dashboard and optional DHCP service.

Use cases

• Block ads and trackers on all devices in a home network without installing browser extensions.
• Replace the router's DNS with Pi-hole to filter unwanted content at the network level.
• Provide a DHCP server that automatically configures clients to use Pi-hole for DNS.
• Improve browsing speed by caching DNS queries locally.
• Combine Pi-hole with a VPN to extend ad‑blocking to mobile devices on cellular networks.
• Protect IoT devices and smart TVs from unwanted network traffic.

When to choose

• You need a simple, low‑cost solution for network‑wide ad blocking.
• You want to run the blocker on a Raspberry Pi or any Linux box.
• You prefer a single point of control with a web UI and API.
• You want to add DHCP functionality without extra hardware.

When to avoid

• You require per‑user or per‑application ad‑blocking policies.
• Your environment demands enterprise‑grade high‑availability DNS services.
• You need a Windows‑only or client‑side ad‑blocking solution.
• Complex DNS routing or split‑horizon configurations are required.

Facets

application · maturity active

http-server networking security privacy cli ad-blocker network-wide lightweight vpn-compatible raspberry-pi dns-server dhcp-server linux docker

Member repositories

For agents

markdown · JSON · MCP: product_card(name="pi-hole/pi-hole")