Best ngrok Alternatives in 2025: Self-Hosted & Free Localhost Tunnels

ngrok is the dominant tool for exposing localhost to the internet — useful for webhook testing, sharing dev environments, and demoing work-in-progress apps. But ngrok's free tier is increasingly limited: one online tunnel, rate-limited requests, no custom domains, and recently added device limits.

Here are the best ngrok alternatives in 2025, from free self-hosted options to managed services.

1. Cloudflare Tunnel (Free, Managed)

Cloudflare Tunnel (formerly Argo Tunnel) is arguably the best free ngrok alternative for most use cases. It creates an outbound-only connection from your machine to Cloudflare's edge, with no open inbound ports required.

• Completely free for basic tunneling
• Custom domains on your Cloudflare account at no extra cost
• DDoS protection and WAF included
• Requires a Cloudflare account and DNS managed by Cloudflare
• No rate limits on free tier

# Install cloudflared
brew install cloudflare/cloudflare/cloudflared

# Authenticate and create a tunnel
cloudflared tunnel login
cloudflared tunnel create my-dev-tunnel
cloudflared tunnel route dns my-dev-tunnel dev.yourdomain.com
cloudflared tunnel run --url http://localhost:3000 my-dev-tunnel

2. Deployzy Tunnel (Built-in, No Extra Subscription)

If you're already using Deployzy to deploy apps, the localhost tunnel is built in — no separate account or subscription needed. Install the Deployzy CLI and expose any local port in one command.

npx deployzy tunnel 3000
# → https://abc123.deployzy.site

• Included in Deployzy's free tier
• Request inspection UI built-in (inspect headers, body, replay requests)
• Persistent subdomains available
• No device or tunnel count limits on paid plans

3. bore (Self-Hosted, Open Source)

bore is a minimal, Rust-based self-hosted tunnel. You run the bore server on any VPS and the bore client locally. It's extremely lightweight (~4 MB binary) and easy to audit.

# On your VPS:
bore server

# Locally:
bore local 3000 --to your-vps-ip.com
# → http://your-vps-ip.com:2000

• Open-source (MIT license), no telemetry
• Requires your own VPS
• No HTTPS by default (add Nginx + Certbot for TLS)
• No web UI for request inspection

4. frp (Self-Hosted)

frp (Fast Reverse Proxy) is a mature self-hosted solution from China's open-source community. It supports HTTP, HTTPS, TCP, UDP, and WebSocket tunneling, and has a web dashboard.

• Supports HTTP/HTTPS/TCP/UDP/WebSocket
• Web dashboard for monitoring tunnels
• Requires a VPS + configuration file (frps.toml on server, frpc.toml locally)
• More complex setup than bore

5. Tailscale Funnel (Free, Managed)

Tailscale Funnel exposes a port on your Tailscale node to the public internet. If you already use Tailscale for secure networking, this is zero additional cost.

# Expose port 3000 publicly
tailscale funnel 3000

• Free with Tailscale account
• Automatic HTTPS on *.ts.net domain
• Requires Tailscale installed on both client and server
• Limited to 3 funnels on free tier

Which Should You Use?

• Simplest free option with custom domain → Cloudflare Tunnel
• Already using Deployzy for deployment → built-in Deployzy tunnel
• Need full control + privacy → self-host bore or frp on a VPS
• Already in the Tailscale ecosystem → Tailscale Funnel
• Need persistent URLs + request inspection on a budget → Deployzy