Starlink or 5G as a backup line, without losing your address
A second internet line keeps you online when the first one fails. But each line comes with its own address, so anything people reach you on breaks when the router switches. With TunnelNet Business the address belongs to the site, not the line.
The usual problem
Your main line is cable or fiber, and you add Starlink or a 5G modem as a backup. Both lines are often behind CGNAT, and even when they're not, they have different addresses. When the router fails over, cameras, remote desktop and anything on an allowlist are still pointed at the old address.
How the address follows
Your router keeps an encrypted tunnel to us over whichever line is working. The address lives on our network. When the router moves to the backup line, the tunnel comes back up over it, and the address goes with it. Nothing outside needs to change.
What we measured, in our lab
| Router | Time to answer again after the main line was cut |
|---|---|
| MikroTik | 2 to 3 seconds |
| OPNsense | 4 to 6 seconds (5 of 5 cuts) |
| UniFi agent, on a test gateway set up like a UniFi one | 2.3 seconds (3 runs) |
Lab numbers, not a promise: your time depends on your router, your lines and how quickly the router notices the main line is down. Switching back to the main line lost nothing in our lab.
One thing failover can't cover: if our own hub stays up but stops forwarding traffic, there is no automatic failover, because your router's lines are fine. Those events go on our uptime page.
Setting it up
- Set up your router's two lines and its failover first, without TunnelNet, and make sure it switches.
- Add the site to TunnelNet: UniFi, MikroTik or OPNsense.
- Test it: unplug the main line and check the address from outside.
Using both lines at once, on one address, is coming soon.