How to Set up PiHole with Docker on your Home Network (Ft: Traefik Reverse Proxy)

[WIP]

If you’ve seen the price of Raspberry Pis recently — with the state of the world and ongoing chip shortages — you might be thinking, “I can’t afford a Raspberry Pi.” Well, good news: you can run PiHole in a Docker container right on your home network. This is a great way to get started without spending a lot on hardware. But what if you don’t want to buy a Raspberry Pi, or don’t have one lying around? No problem — Docker makes it easy. I picked up a thin client off eBay — 4GB RAM, 16GB storage — for around $50. Prices have gone up recently, but it’s still way cheaper than a Pi (currently around $250–400 😬). It came with embedded Windows, but after some BIOS tinkering I got it to boot from a USB drive. I installed Ubuntu Server 20.04, and it’s been running great since. I’ve got a few other services running on it too — that’s a story for another day. I’ll let Copilot give you a quick rundown of Docker and PiHole, but if you just want the installation steps, skip ahead.

What is PiHole?

PiHole is a DNS sinkhole that protects your devices from unwanted content — no client software required. It blocks ads and trackers across your entire network and provides a clean web interface showing:

Connected devices
DNS queries made
Blocked domains and IPs

What is Docker?

Docker is a containerization platform that runs applications in isolated environments called containers. It’s great for running software with complex dependencies or tricky installs, and works across different operating systems — e.g. running Linux apps on Windows or vice versa.

Why use Docker?

Docker lets you run apps on your home network without cluttering your host system. Instead of manually installing and configuring something like a Minecraft server, you can:

Pull the app image from Docker Hub
Configure it via a simple docker-compose.yml
Run it in seconds

No messy installs, no port conflicts, no dependency nightmares.

How to Use Docker

Install Docker → Get Docker
Install Docker Compose → Get Docker Compose

Installation

With Traefik

I’ve been using Traefik as a reverse proxy for everything lately. This setup assumes you already have a Traefik instance and a Docker network ready. If not, here’s a minimal but functional docker-compose.yml to get started. Create a traefik directory:

Bash

mkdir traefik
cd traefik
vim docker-compose.yml

Paste this:

Yaml

version: "3.3"

services:
  traefik:
    image: "traefik:v2.4"
    container_name: "traefik"
    command:
      - "--api.insecure=true"
      - "--providers.docker=true"
      - "--providers.docker.exposedbydefault=false"
      - "--entrypoints.web.address=:80"
    ports:
      - "80:80"
      - "443:443"
      - "52:52" # only needed if you want to use DNS over HTTPS
    volumes:
      - "/var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock:ro"
    networks:
      - lan
    labels:
      - "traefik.enable=true"
      - "traefik.http.routers.api.rule=Host(`traefik.local`)"
      - "traefik.http.routers.api.service=api@internal"
      - "traefik.http.routers.api.entrypoints=web"

networks:
  lan:
    external: true

PiHole

We’ll use the official PiHole Docker image from Docker Hub, alongside the Traefik Docker image. Create a new directory:

Bash

mkdir pihole
cd pihole
vim docker-compose.yml

Paste this:

Yaml

version: "3.3"

services:
  pihole:
    image: "pihole/pihole:latest"
    container_name: "pihole"
    environment:
      - TZ="Australia/Melbourne"
      - WEBPASSWORD="yourpassword"
      - DNS1=8.8.8.8

Copy/Paste TL;DR

Lifted from this example:

Bash

mkdir traefik-pihole
cd traefik-pihole
vim docker-compose.yml

Then paste:

Yaml

version: '3'

services:
  traefik:
    container_name: traefik
    domainname: homedomain.lan
    image: traefik
    restart: unless-stopped
    command: "--web --docker --docker.domain=homedomain.lan --docker.exposedbydefault=false --logLevel=DEBUG"
    ports:
      - "80:80"
      - "443:443"
      - "8080:8080"
    volumes:
      - /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock
      - /dev/null:/traefik.toml
    networks:
      - default
      - discovery
    dns:
      - 192.168.1.50
      - 192.168.1.1

  pihole:
    container_name: pihole
    domainname: homedomain.lan
    image: diginc/pi-hole:debian
    ports:
      - '0.0.0.0:53:53/tcp'
      - '0.0.0.0:53:53/udp'
      - '0.0.0.0:67:67/udp'
      - '0.0.0.0:8053:80/tcp'
    volumes:
      - ./etc-pihole/:/etc/pihole/
      - ./etc-dnsmasqd/:/etc/dnsmasq.d/
    environment:
      ServerIP: 192.168.1.50
      PROXY_LOCATION: pihole
      VIRTUAL_HOST: pihole.homedomain.lan
      VIRTUAL_PORT: 80
      TZ: 'America/Chicago'
    restart: unless-stopped
    labels:
      - "traefik.enable=true"
      - "traefik.frontend.rule=HostRegexp:pihole.homedomain.lan,{catchall:.*}"
      - "traefik.frontend.priority=1"
      - "traefik.backend=pihole"
      - "traefik.port=80"

networks:
  discovery:
    external: true

✅ Done! You now have PiHole running behind Traefik in Docker — no Raspberry Pi required. Enjoy network-wide ad blocking and analytics right from your browser.