Any way to add devices to your tailnet without sharing Google login credentials?

Tailscale About articles (troubleshooting, info)
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Tailscale version: 1.40.0
Your operating system & version: Windows 10, Version 10.0.19045 Build 19045

Hello, Andrew here.

I recently started using TailScale (It’s awesome btw) for hosting a Minecraft server. I’ve tried other VPNs, but TS has been by far the easiest to setup and the highest performance. My only issue is user access.

I’d rather not give my friends my Google login credentials, nor would they want them anyway. Getting them to install TS is going to be a stretch regardless. My issue / question, is there some way I can allow other users besides myself to add devices to my tailnet? Forgive me if I’ve overlooked some documentation, but the only way I can see to authorize other users is if I created my own email domain. Could I give them some sort of API key or login authorization without giving them my Google credentials?

Thanks,
Andrew

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You could share your node to them: Sharing your nodes with other users · Tailscale

Basically, they will make their own tailnet (using their own email addresses) and you share your node that has Minecraft to them. You won’t have access to each other’s tailnets, it’s just that they can access the device you shared with them (and nothing else).

An alternative would be to have your own domain and let them login via their own email accounts on that domain (e.g. you@yourdomain.com, friend1@yourdomain.com, friend2@yourdomain.com, etc.).
This allows you to share a tailnet with two other people (i.e. a max of 3 users).
Then you would control access to everything in that tailnet via ACLs.

Yet another option would be to use the “Community on GitHub” plan, where you create a GitHub organization and use that for your tailnet. This way you can have up to 25 users, but it has a few different limitations compared to the 3-user plan.

For your use-case though the easiest way would be the first method I described, i.e. let them create their own tailnets (by using their own email addresses) and simply share your node with them. :slight_smile:

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I’ll look into the options you’ve given me.

Thanks!