31 May 2023 Reading time: 3 minutes

Meet ispmanager with VPN

Ispmanager

On May 31, integration with WireGuard for lite, pro and host versions became available in beta release 6.75. To learn more, please read our Telegram, there we are going to explain you how it works with ispmanager.

How to enable

To enable WireGuard, go to “Settings → Software configuration” and start installing it. After the installation icon disappears, it means the installation is complete. If it appears to you that the installation progress is taking too long, reload the page and verify WireGuard status, as the installation may have already been completed.

If you are not much concerned with the workload and what websites your VPN users are going to visit, feel free to omit further configuring routine by skipping the next step. All systems go :) WireGuard is now available to every panel administrator enabling them to create new VPN users in the menu section of the same name.

How to configure

With no additional settings, VPN with ispmanager follows the principle “all traffic is directed via VPN”, yet all the same, when creating a new user, you can specify which addresses, or a range of addresses, will pass through VPN. For instance, this comes in handy when configuring a working subnet whereby you permit only a certain panel address (or other addresses available with the control panel) to connect to your network, specifying only the working network IP in the settings. From the client's device, WireGuard will only make calls to the working network via VPN, while the rest of the user's traffic will run directly through their Internet connection. This makes it much easier to control the load on your server and traffic. Read documents to learn more about WireGuard and its configuration settings.

new user vpn
“Routed addresses” field specifies a range of addresses a client will connect to using VPN. “0.0.0.0/0” stands for any address. “Owner” indicates the control panel user to display the VPN settings to; if there is no such user, select “Administrators are owners”.

How to use

From panel

Only the control panel administrators can create VPN users. When creating a new VPN user it is possible to specify its owner: either administrators or a certain control panel user. In the latter case, apart from administrators, the specified user will also see the provided connection settings. It is quite unnecessary to create a special control panel account for someone who will use VPN only. For example, you can send them a connection code using a secure channel: via self-destructing messages on an encrypted Telegram chat or through a page with password-protected access. You can send them insecurely if you please, no one is there to forbid you doing this, yet you should know better :)

vpn menu
You can download the configuration file or scan the QR code displayed by the corresponding menu items on the toolbar. If a control panel user is selected as the owner, then only these items will be displayed for them, with no option to configure a VPN or create new users.

From device

Next, some operations should be performed at the device that will be connected via VPN. You are required to install WireGuard (available for either smartphones or PCs) and run it. Then choose “Add tunnel” and indicate the downloaded file for PC. For smartphones, you can either import files or scan a QR code by pressing the Add button. After that, turn the VPN on and off as needed.

wireguard app
This is how the PC application window looks like. The application also displays the amount of traffic you have expended during the current connection.

How to benefit

If you run ispmanager lite, pro or host, then why not capitalize on VPN? Just install WireGuard, create a number of accounts, and provide them to those willing to connect. Bear in mind that the more devices are connected to the same address, the more suspicious such connection would appear to the websites that accept it. Some of them might issue an error 429 and ban such connection for a while. Nonetheless, the bulk of websites allow a pretty wide range of connections from a single address, so both the cost of VPS and the cost of ispmanager may soon pay off :D

And if you don’t use ispmanager as yet, although the sound of minted coins is ringing in your head as you read this, stop dithering and buy ispmanager right away!