ESP32 Tailscale COR

This branch is the standalone ESP-IDF edition of ESP32 Tailscale COR.

It connects an ESP32 directly to a Tailscale tailnet without ESPHome and keeps the Tailscale control implementation on the device itself:

• TLS to controlplane.tailscale.com:443
• Noise IK handshake
• HTTP/2 control stream
• node registration with a Tailscale auth key
• persisted local identity in NVS
• live map streaming and serial diagnostics

Branch layout

This repository now has two product lines:

• general: standalone ESP-IDF project without ESPHome
• esphome: ESPHome external component line

The existing ESPHome release tags stay on the ESPHome line. Because Git tags are global across the repository, the standalone line uses its own tag namespace for releases.

Standalone 1.0.0 scope

This standalone line intentionally includes:

• a native idf.py project
• WiFi and auth-key configuration through menuconfig
• the current working Tailscale control implementation adapted away from ESPHome preferences
• optional ingress advertisement fields for external Serve/Funnel setups

It intentionally does not include:

• ESPHome YAML
• ESPHome web_server:
• bundled Home Assistant dashboards

Requirements

• ESP32, ESP32-S2, or ESP32-S3
• ESP-IDF 5.5.x
• a Tailscale auth key

Not supported:

• ESP32-C3
• ESP32-C6
• ESP32-H2
• Arduino framework

Configure

Open the project with ESP-IDF and set your values in menuconfig:

idf.py set-target esp32
idf.py menuconfig

Relevant options live under:

ESP32 Tailscale COR Standalone

Configure at least:

• TS_WIFI_SSID
• TS_WIFI_PASSWORD
• TS_AUTH_KEY
• TS_DEVICE_NAME

Optional:

• TS_WIRE_INGRESS
• TS_INGRESS_ENABLED
• TS_ADVERTISED_SERVICE_PORT

Build and flash

idf.py build
idf.py flash monitor

Project structure

components/esp32_tailscale_cor/
main/
CMakeLists.txt
sdkconfig.defaults

Diagnostics

On a successful boot, the serial monitor shows:

• WiFi connect state
• Tailscale identity source
• machine and node key fingerprints
• assigned Tailscale IP
• peer count from the latest map stream

Release tagging

The standalone line starts at logical version 1.0.0. To avoid colliding with the already existing ESPHome tag v1.0.0, standalone releases use branch-specific tags such as:

• general-v1.0.0

Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md.

License

The original project code in this branch is source-available under the PolyForm Noncommercial License 1.0.0.

Commercial use of that original project code is not permitted under this license.

See:

• LICENSE
• NOTICE