Basic questions on the GL VPN servers

Technical Support for Routers
1

General questions on running the built-in VPN servers in the GL routers:

  1. If I want to connect to the same VPN server from different devices (e.g. multiple Laptops) simultaneously, should I use the same VPN client config, or different ones. In other words, is a VPN config generated in the Management panel intended per-user or per-user/per-device? When I use a commercial VPN I know that my config file is only per-user and I can use it simultaneously on multiple devices, but I am not sure if the same is true here. Also, is the answer the same for both OpenVPN and WireGaurd servers?

  2. Can I run both OpenVPN and WireGuard servers on the same router at the same time with no conflicts of any kind (assuming enough CPU and different ports of course)?

2

The VPN configuration can be used with multiple devices, both Openvpn and Wireguard.

You can run Openvpn and Wireguard server at the same time.

3

for wireguard you can’t use the same config simultaneously on multiple devices, you need one config per device if you plan to use it at the same time.

4

Ok, I’m clear on OpenVPN that I can reuse the same config.

On WireGuard, I’m getting conflicting opinions from the replies…

So, can I use the same config file on two devices for simultaneous connections to the same WG server or not??

5

Wireguard client configs include a unique IP address. For this reason you cannot successfully connect clients to the same server simultaneously with the same config. It is a similar porblem if you were to give all the devices on your home network the same IP address. In theory I suppose that the same public/private key could be used simultaneously when connecting to different servers with only one client config.

If I am not mistaken, OpenVPN config is more like having a username and password that you can login with on as many devices as allowed by the server.

6

Ok that makes sense. You are referring to “address” line in the config, which I assume is the IP address the VPN server assigns to the client. So that means each device must use a different config file to get a unique IP…