5 ms·

NextDNS is my new favourite DNS service (2020)

33 points by mefengl 9mo ago

ra 9mo ago
this post is from 2020
nothrowaways 9mo ago
[flagged]
- senectus1 9mo ago
  how the hell did you come to that conclusion?
ksec 9mo ago
I dont have actual data to back it up, but out of the DNS services, ad-blocking or not. I feel NextDNS has the fastest DNS Network. And it is very consistent. To the point I wish NextDNS would start offering Managed DNS services like Amazon Route 53 or DnsMadeEasy.
- commandersaki 9mo ago
  I don't have any data either, but I don't think DNS is perceptible as something that is fast or slow, considering that the vast amount of recursive servers which is what clients connect to, aggressively cache. Add to this that most have a low latency connection to their DNS server whether it be their last mile ISP or an anycast provider which is virtually all public resolvers.
  - ksec 9mo ago
    That was initially what I thought as well. Until I tried out Google DNS, and then Cloudflare 1.1.1.1 before settling on NextDNS.
  - seec 9mo ago
    It does have a great impact. Nowadays TTL are pretty short because infra is very dynamic, you don't necessarily hit the cache that often. And a random webpage will pull assests from all over the place, with many different domains/subdomains, all requiring DNS resolution. In the end, even if it's hidden you can definitely feel it in the "snapiness" of loading webpages. Of course when you only load/stream content it has no impact, so it is really dependent on your usage patterns. Running your own private DNS resolver is also much faster, even with a medium org, you can definitely feel it.
stranded22 9mo ago
That’s by someone who hasn’t discovered controld.
- ahofmann 9mo ago
  I tried controld and wasn't impressed. In what way is controld better than nextdns?
  - pseudobry 9mo ago
    I also switched to controld after a period of unreliability from from NextDNS. NextDNS is a little easier and a little faster, and perhaps better for auditing a network, but controld overall has more features. Differentiators: more granular control in blocking related functionality, can replace your VPN for certain use cases, control over traffic flow and proxying, etc
- morgan814 9mo ago
  I somewhat begrudgingly switched to ControlD after years with NextDNS. The NextDNS web UI is flippin fast and very simple. Feels more akin to HN. ControlD’s is slow and feels so heavy. Maybe more like new Reddit. ControlD offers Hagezi’s TIF list and allows custom lists to be set. NextDNS’s built-in TIF is very opaque. This was really the deciding factor for me. Unfortunately.
rpgbr 9mo ago
I use NextDNS since 2021, after a frustrating experience with Pi-Hole in a Raspberry Pi 3b (system broke by itself every other month, I think because faulty SD cards). NextDNS is so good, and their free tier so generous, that sometimes I feel bad for not having to pay for it. Can’t recommend enough.
upcoming-sesame 9mo ago
I've been a nextdns paying customer for years. it's great service. my only issue with it is that when sites break, it is hard to fix (by adding and exclusion / whitelist). I wish they had some browser extension that let me whitelist more easily
- ksec 9mo ago
  Same here. I wish the App would allow me to add / edit whitelist.
thewisenerd 9mo ago
inb4 "tailscale hurr durr", if you are using tailscale already, with it setup as the DNS resolver, you can setup NextDNS as the global resolver within tailscale[1]; i'm not sure exactly how much my latency's being affected, but am at something like 900k queries/mo and don't really notice it [1] https://tailscale.com/kb/1218/nextdns https://tailscale.com/kb/1218/nextdns

33 points by mefengl 9mo ago

ra 9mo ago

this post is from 2020

nothrowaways 9mo ago

[flagged]

senectus1 9mo ago
how the hell did you come to that conclusion?

ksec 9mo ago

I dont have actual data to back it up, but out of the DNS services, ad-blocking or not. I feel NextDNS has the fastest DNS Network. And it is very consistent. To the point I wish NextDNS would start offering Managed DNS services like Amazon Route 53 or DnsMadeEasy.

commandersaki 9mo ago
I don't have any data either, but I don't think DNS is perceptible as something that is fast or slow, considering that the vast amount of recursive servers which is what clients connect to, aggressively cache. Add to this that most have a low latency connection to their DNS server whether it be their last mile ISP or an anycast provider which is virtually all public resolvers.
- ksec 9mo ago
  That was initially what I thought as well. Until I tried out Google DNS, and then Cloudflare 1.1.1.1 before settling on NextDNS.
- seec 9mo ago
  It does have a great impact. Nowadays TTL are pretty short because infra is very dynamic, you don't necessarily hit the cache that often. And a random webpage will pull assests from all over the place, with many different domains/subdomains, all requiring DNS resolution. In the end, even if it's hidden you can definitely feel it in the "snapiness" of loading webpages. Of course when you only load/stream content it has no impact, so it is really dependent on your usage patterns. Running your own private DNS resolver is also much faster, even with a medium org, you can definitely feel it.

stranded22 9mo ago

That’s by someone who hasn’t discovered controld.

ahofmann 9mo ago
I tried controld and wasn't impressed. In what way is controld better than nextdns?
- pseudobry 9mo ago
  I also switched to controld after a period of unreliability from from NextDNS. NextDNS is a little easier and a little faster, and perhaps better for auditing a network, but controld overall has more features. Differentiators: more granular control in blocking related functionality, can replace your VPN for certain use cases, control over traffic flow and proxying, etc
morgan814 9mo ago
I somewhat begrudgingly switched to ControlD after years with NextDNS. The NextDNS web UI is flippin fast and very simple. Feels more akin to HN. ControlD’s is slow and feels so heavy. Maybe more like new Reddit. ControlD offers Hagezi’s TIF list and allows custom lists to be set. NextDNS’s built-in TIF is very opaque. This was really the deciding factor for me. Unfortunately.

rpgbr 9mo ago

I use NextDNS since 2021, after a frustrating experience with Pi-Hole in a Raspberry Pi 3b (system broke by itself every other month, I think because faulty SD cards). NextDNS is so good, and their free tier so generous, that sometimes I feel bad for not having to pay for it. Can’t recommend enough.

upcoming-sesame 9mo ago

I've been a nextdns paying customer for years. it's great service. my only issue with it is that when sites break, it is hard to fix (by adding and exclusion / whitelist). I wish they had some browser extension that let me whitelist more easily

ksec 9mo ago
Same here. I wish the App would allow me to add / edit whitelist.

thewisenerd 9mo ago

inb4 "tailscale hurr durr", if you are using tailscale already, with it setup as the DNS resolver, you can setup NextDNS as the global resolver within tailscale[1]; i'm not sure exactly how much my latency's being affected, but am at something like 900k queries/mo and don't really notice it [1] https://tailscale.com/kb/1218/nextdns https://tailscale.com/kb/1218/nextdns