What happens when you mix a Raspberry Pi, a hackathon idea, and the world’s first application-aware VPN? You get the Border0 Router, a fun, open-source project that turns a Pi into a plug-and-play secure Wi-Fi access point.
The Border0 Router is a custom Raspberry Pi image that transforms your Pi into a convenient wireless router with Border0’s identity-aware VPN baked in. In plain English: set up the Pi at home (or anywhere), and any device that connects to its Wi-Fi instantly gains secure access to your chosen resources and networks via Border0. No more juggling VPN apps or fiddling with settings, just join the Pi’s Wi-Fi and you’re in. It’s casual enough for home tinkerers, but technical enough to satisfy pros who want a Zero Trust style VPN solution on their own hardware.
Born at a Hackathon, Perfected at Home
Like many cool tech projects, the Border0 Router has humble beginnings: our team dreamed it up during a Border0 hackathon. As a remote-first crew spread across the globe, we were brainstorming ways to simplify secure access for ourselves. Someone joked, “Wouldn’t it be neat if a Raspberry Pi could just create a secure Wi-Fi network wherever we go?” By the end of the hackathon, the Border0-Pi Router was alive (and winning hearts)!
This project was such a hit internally that we polished it up and open-sourced it. Many of us now use it at home and on the road, geeking out over how a weekend experiment became something genuinely useful.
What Exactly Is the Border0 Router?
Essentially, the Border0 Router is a ready-to-go Raspberry Pi image that transforms your Pi into a secure Wi-Fi hotspot and VPN gateway.
When you boot your Pi with this image, it becomes a Wi-Fi Access Point, broadcasting a network you control with your own name and password, much like your home router but on a tiny, dedicated device. Border0 VPN Integration is baked in; behind the scenes, the Pi runs an Application-Aware VPN client that establishes a secure, authenticated tunnel, routing all connected devices' traffic through it. This enables Identity-Aware Access Policies, meaning you can enforce your Border0 policies, deciding exactly which private networks or applications clients can reach and leveraging SSO-based access rules transparently. It's like extending your Border0 secure network, giving you fine-grained control over traffic. Plus, with Exit Nodes of Your Choice, you can select where your traffic exits, allowing you to browse as if you're home while traveling or route IoT traffic through a specific data center.
Quick Start – From Zero to Connected in Minutes
One of our goals was to make setup incredibly easy. We know not everyone enjoys wrestling with Raspberry Pi configs, so we built a friendly guided setup. Getting your own Border0 Router running is a breeze. Simply follow the steps below, or check the instructional video that explains the steps involved.
Download the Image: Grab the open-source and free Border0 Router SD card image from our GitHub repo. You'll find the latest release and detailed instructions there.
Flash to SD Card: Use the Raspberry Pi Imager (or your preferred tool) to flash the downloaded image onto a microSD card. (If you've imaged a Pi before, this will feel familiar; if not, our GitHub has a step-by-step guide.)
Boot the Pi: Connect the Ethernet port to the Internet, insert the SD card into your Raspberry Pi, and power it on. Give it a minute to boot up. The first time it runs, it will automatically start a setup wizard.
Follow these steps: Connect to the Pi’s temporary setup Wi-Fi, it will broadcast border0 SSID.
• Navigate to http://gateway.border0 (or http://10.10.10.10).
• Enter the name of the Border0 organization you want to associate with.
• Complete the SSO login with your Border0 account credentials. (This links the Pi to your Border0 organization/account.)
• (Optional) Update your Wi-Fi settings (enter a new SSID, select mode, and set the pass).
• (Optional) Select your desired Exit-Node.
Done – Ready to Go! The Pi will reboot into operational mode. Now you’ll see your configured Wi-Fi network appear. Connect your laptop or phone to the Pi’s Wi-Fi SSID, use the password you set, and voilà! Your device is now securely connected via Border0. You can immediately start using your internal apps/resources as if you were on a VPN: because you are.
That’s it! No Linux commands, no confusing steps. From downloading the image to having a working secure hotspot, it typically takes just a few minutes (most of that is simply waiting for the image to flash). In our internal testing, the actual setup work was about one minute; the rest is automated. We truly aimed for a plug-and-play experience so even semi-technical users can handle it.
Of course, being engineers, we also love to tinker. Since the project is open source, advanced users are welcome to modify the configuration, extend the code, or repurpose the image for other hardware. But that’s totally optional!
Use Cases – Who Is This For?
The Border0 Router unlocks a ton of possibilities for secure connectivity. Here are a few scenarios we’re excited about:
🌍 Travelers: Home Away from Home – When you’re on the road, public Wi-Fi can be a security nightmare. With a Border0 Router, a traveler can bring a Pi router along in their bag. For example, imagine you’re staying at a hotel: connect the Pi to the hotel’s internet, fire it up, and now all your devices route through your home exit node securely. You’ll browse as if you were back in your living room, with all data encrypted. No more worrying about evil twin Wi-Fi attacks or region-locked content – the Pi keeps you safe and makes the internet think you’re at home. It’s like carrying a tiny piece of your home network wherever you go.
💼 Remote Employees: Office in a Box – Companies can use Border0 Router to equip remote staff with a plug-and-play secure network. Instead of provisioning complex VPN software on every device, IT can ship a pre-configured Raspberry Pi to the employee. The employee just connects it to their home router and joins the new Wi-Fi network. Instantly, their laptop and any other work devices are tunnelled into the corporate network with the correct access policies. This setup ensures that even less tech-savvy team members get a one-step secure connection to company resources. (No more “Did you remember to connect the VPN?” – if they’re on the Wi-Fi, they’re on the VPN.). With this setup you segment work devices onto a dedicated secure Wi-Fi SSID, separate from personal devices, which is a nice security bonus for home office setups.
🔒 Privacy & Home Lab Enthusiasts: Take Control – If you’re the kind of person who runs a home lab or cares deeply about online privacy, the Border0 Router is a great gadget. It’s an open-source, self-hostable solution, meaning you’re in complete control. You don’t have to trust a third-party VPN provider with your traffic – you essentially become your own provider. By self-hosting your VPN on a Pi, you gain a higher level of control over your data and online activities, ensuring they remain private and secure. For instance, you can route all your smart home tools through the Pi to isolate them from the broader internet, or use the Pi as a gateway to access your NAS and servers remotely without exposing ports. Home automation geeks, lab builders, and anyone who likes tinkering will appreciate the flexibility. It’s ideal for home labs: connect your lab network to the Pi and manage it from anywhere as if you were on-site. And because it’s Border0, you can even enforce SSO or MFA on yourself for those lab resources (yes, some of us do that for fun!).
✨ More Creative Uses: We’re sure the community will come up with scenarios we haven’t thought of. From securing IoT deployments in the field, to setting up temporary secure Wi-Fi at a small office or event – the possibilities are vast. If there’s a need for secure, policy-driven connectivity in a portable form factor, the Border0 Router has you covered.
Open Source & Community – Join Us
The Border0 Router project is completely open source, and we're thrilled to share it with the community. You can find all the code and full documentation on GitHub, just head over to the border0-router repo for everything you need. We invite you to peek under the hood, file issues, and contribute improvements or new ideas. Whether it's adding support for other single-board computers, new features, or refining the setup wizard, community contributions are highly encouraged.
This project truly reflects our team's passion for building infrastructure that doesn't suck (yes, it should be fun!). We built the Border0 Router because we wanted it for ourselves, and now we want you to have it too. Our engineers already rely on these Pi routers to connect to their dev environments and personal networks from home, cafes, and even airplanes. It's been a joy for us, and we're eager to see how you use it.
Ready to Try It Out?
Border0's core mission is to make secure access simpler and more accessible. The Border0 Router extends this into the hardware realm, combining the versatility of Raspberry Pi with the security of the Border0 platform. It's a perfect weekend project for your home lab, a thoughtful gift for a privacy-conscious friend, or a scalable solution for your remote workforce. And because it’s open source, you’re truly in the driver’s seat
Dust off that Raspberry Pi and give the Border0 Router a spin! Download the image, flash it, and in no time, you'll have your own personal secure Wi-Fi hotspot. We're confident you'll love the convenience of simply connecting to Wi-Fi and knowing your traffic is safe, encrypted, and policy-compliant.
We'll continue to improve the Border0 Router based on your feedback and our own use cases. Have an idea, or ran into a bug? Open an issue or pull request on GitHub! Our team and the community would love to collaborate. This started as a fun hackathon creation, and it's now an evolving project driven by people who genuinely care about security and simplicity.
Secure Wi-Fi anywhere, made simple. That’s the Border0 Router in a nutshell. We can’t wait to hear your stories, whether it saved your bacon on a work trip or became the backbone of your smart home setup. Let us know how you're using it, and welcome to the Border0 Router community! Happy hacking :)
.png)
Ready to level up
your security?
