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Quickstart Guide

Step-by-step video guide on YouTube:


This guide describes how to quickly get started with NetBird and create a secure private network with 2 connected machines.

One machine is a Linux laptop, and the other one a EC2 node running on AWS. Both machines are running Linux but NetBird also works on Windows and MacOS.

  1. Sign-up at https://app.netbird.io/

    You can use your Google, GitHub or Microsoft account.

  2. After a successful login you will be redirected to the Peers screen which is empty because you don't have any peers yet.

    Click Add peer to add a new machine.

  3. Choose your machine operating system (in our case it is Linux) and proceed with the installation steps.

  4. If you installed NetBird Desktop UI you can use it to connect to the network instead of running netbird up command. Look for NetBird in your application list, run it, and click Connect.

  5. At this point a browser window pops up starting a device registration process. Click confirm and follow the steps if required.

  6. On the EC2 node repeat the installation steps and run netbird up command. 

    sudo netbird up

  7. Copy the verification URL from the terminal output and paste it in your browser. Repeat step #5

  8. Return to Peers and you should notice 2 new machines with status online

  9. To test the connection you could try pinging devices:

    On your laptop:

    ping 100.64.0.2

    On the EC2 node:

    ping 100.64.0.1

  10. Done! You now have a secure peer-to-peer private network configured.