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Access Your Home Lab From Anywhere Without Port Forwarding

Plex, Home Assistant, Pi-hole — reach every service on your home server from anywhere. Zero open ports.

February 2026

You spent weeks building the perfect home lab — Plex for media, Home Assistant for automation, Pi-hole for ad blocking, maybe a NAS and a few Docker containers. Everything works beautifully on your local network. But the moment you leave the house, it all disappears. With Ghost Networks, your home lab follows you everywhere — without touching your router settings.

The Home Lab Dilemma

Getting remote access to a home lab usually means fighting your ISP, your router, and your own security instincts. The traditional options are all painful.

Port forwarding: exposes services to the entire internet
Dynamic DNS: breaks when your ISP changes your IP
Reverse proxy + TLS: hours of NGINX config and certificate management
CGNAT / double NAT: port forwarding not even possible
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Step 1: Install the Connector on Your Home Server

Run two commands on your home server. The Ghost Connector installs as a lightweight daemon and connects your machine to your Ghost network. No router changes needed.

# Install the Ghost Connector
curl -fsSL https://gh-o.net/d/connector/install.sh | bash
# Set up with your HELbind key
ghost_connector setup --cert /path/to/helbind-key.json

The connector works behind CGNAT, double NAT, and restrictive firewalls. It punches out — no incoming ports required.

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Step 2: Create a Phantom Hub for Your Lab

Group your home server and the devices you want to access it from into a Phantom Hub. Only devices inside the hub can see each other.

# Create a hub for your home lab
ghost-cli hubs create --name "home-lab"
# Add your home server and your phone
ghost-cli hubs add-device --hub <hub-id> \
--device <home-server-id>
ghost-cli hubs add-device --hub <hub-id> \
--device <my-phone-id>
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Step 3: Access Everything, From Anywhere

Connect to your Ghost network on your phone or laptop. Your home server's private IP is now reachable — as if you were on your home Wi-Fi.

http://172.16.0.2:32400 — Plex
http://172.16.0.2:8123 — Home Assistant
http://172.16.0.2:80 — Pi-hole

Services That Just Work

🎬

Plex / Jellyfin

Stream your media library from anywhere

🏠

Home Assistant

Control your smart home remotely

🛡

Pi-hole / AdGuard

Ad blocking that follows you everywhere

📦

Nextcloud / NAS

Access files and photos without cloud storage

💻

SSH / Portainer

Manage containers and servers remotely

📷

Cameras / NVR

Check security cameras without exposing feeds

Share With Family

Want your partner or kids to access Plex when they're away from home? Generate a BiFrost Pass — a secure invite link that lets them join your home lab hub with their own devices. Set a device limit and an expiration.

# Create a BiFrost Pass for family
ghost-cli bifrost create --hub <hub-id> \
--max-devices 3 --expires 365d

They install the Ghost Networks app, scan the QR code, and they're in. No passwords, no VPN config files, no tech support calls.

Zero Port Forwarding

Your router stays locked down. Every port closed. Ghost Networks creates an encrypted mesh that works through NAT, CGNAT, and firewalls — no inbound connections needed.

Router
All ports closed
Ghost Mesh
Encrypted tunnel
Anywhere
Full access