Running Pi-hole in My Homelab

One of the most useful additions to my homelab has been a Raspberry Pi running Pi-hole. Pi-hole acts as a network-wide ad blocker and DNS sinkhole, helping keep my devices ad-free, secure, and a little faster when browsing the web.

What Pi-hole Does

Pi-hole works by sitting in the middle of my network as the primary DNS server. Instead of devices reaching out directly to an external DNS server (like Google or Cloudflare), requests are routed through Pi-hole first. If a request matches a domain on its blocklist (for example, an ad server or tracking domain), it gets dropped before it ever reaches the device.

This means:

• Ads and trackers are blocked at the network level
• Every device connected to my network benefits automatically
• Browsing feels faster because unwanted requests never load

The Hardware Setup

In my homelab rack, Pi-hole runs on a dedicated Raspberry Pi. It’s small, efficient, and doesn’t take up much power. The Raspberry Pi connects through my TP-Link switch, making it available to everything in the lab.

Benefits in the Homelab

Aside from ad-blocking, Pi-hole also gives me insight into my network. Its web interface makes it easy to see what domains are being queried, which devices are making requests, and where potential issues might be.

It has become especially useful when testing services in Proxmox VMs—since I can monitor DNS requests and quickly identify what traffic those services are trying to generate.

Why I Like It

Pi-hole may be one of the simplest services in my homelab, but it’s one of the most impactful. The Raspberry Pi handles the workload easily, and the ability to run a clean, ad-free network across all devices makes it well worth having.