Quickstart Guide
This guide describes how to quickly get started with NetBird and create a secure private network with two connected machines. For this tutorial we will use a Macbook and an EC2 node running Linux on AWS.
Install NetBird client
The NetBird client works on almost any platform, including Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android, Docker, routers, and even serverless environments. To get started, install NetBird on your laptop by following the instructions on the installation page:
Connect Your Laptop
NetBird comes with a Desktop UI application that can be found in the systray. If it hasn't automatically started, look
for NetBird in the application list, run it, and click Connect:
Alternatively, you can run the netbird up command in the terminal.
At this point a browser window pops up starting an interactive SSO login session that will register your laptop. You will be prompt to sign up and confirm your device registration:
The NetBird systray icon will turn orange indicating that your laptop was registered in the network:
Confirm the Laptop Registration
After the registration is complete, proceed to the NetBird dashboard to confirm that your
laptop is in the network. You will see it in the Peers view:
Install NetBird on the EC2 Node
Let's install NetBird on the server. In the Peers view, click Add Peer and choose Linux:
Copy the installation script and paste in the terminal of your EC2 node:
curl -fsSL https://pkgs.netbird.io/install.sh | sh
Connect the EC2 Node
In the previous steps you used the interactive SSO login flow to register a user device. This flow is a convenient way to register devices with a user interface. However, for servers or containers that don't have a user interface, you can use a setup key to register them.
To create a setup key, go to the Setup Keys section, click Create Setup Key, name your key, and click Create:
Copy the newly created setup key and use it with the netbird up --setup-key <KEY> command to connect your EC2 node to the network.
Run this command in the terminal of your EC2 node:
netbird up --setup-key PASTE_YOUR_KEY_HERE
Validate the Connection
Return to the Peers view in the NetBird dashboard. You should see two machines in the list:
To test the connection ping the machines from each other:
On your laptop:
ping ec2-demo-node.netbird.cloud
On the EC2 node:
ping mikhails-macbook-pro.netbird.cloud
Done! You now have a secure peer-to-peer WireGuard connection between two machines.
Next Steps
Try creating a network access policy to control the traffic between the two machines.
Support Us
- Star us on GitHub
- Follow us on X
- Join our Slack Channel
- NetBird release page on GitHub: releases