Most people leak more data through DNS than anything else, and they never notice it. This guide breaks down AdGuard vs NextDNS, how each one filters your traffic, and when combining them gives you the strongest privacy setup. If you want a clean, modern DNS stack that actually blocks trackers instead of pretending to, start here.
Privacy is built brick by brick and your DNS layer is one of the most overlooked. Every app you open, every site you touch, every service that leaks telemetry starts with one DNS request. That request exposes where you go, when you go, and how often you go there. The default DNS resolver for most people is who ever they get their internet from like AT&T, Verizon, or Mediacom. Your DNS record is gold for advertisers and state networks and your ISP makes a lot of money selling that information.
To take back your DNS data AdGuard Home and NextDNS are my two go to tools. They both stop the bleed but they operate on different fronts. One lives in your house. One lives in the cloud. And your threat model decides which one protects you. The only thing that actually matters is who sees your DNS traffic and where the filtering happens but let’s get clear on when to use each and when you should run both
AdGuard Home: Local Filtering With Modern Power
AdGuard is a bunker. You install it on your own hardware and it is a self contained filter built into your local network. AdGuard is what Pi-hole wishes it could be in 2026. Same local first design but with modern features and better encryption support. Your devices send DNS requests to AdGuard. It decides yes or no. No one else sees the request unless you explicitly forward it upstream. No cloud dependencies. No middlemen. Just your machine, your blocklists, your rules.
Strengths:
- Full local control
- DNS over HTTPS and DNS over TLS built in
- One setup protects every device connected to your Wi-Fi
- Per device rules
- Built in safe search and parental controls
- Better UX and faster updates than Pi-hole
- Local logs that never leave your LAN
Weaknesses:
- Still local only and needs maintenance, updates, patches, and backup configs.
- Stays home. It won’t protect your phone when you’re out and about on mobile data.
- Blocklists aren’t as deep as large cloud DNS providers
- Single point of failure if your box crashes
- Requires technical know how and networking literacy. Misconfigure DHCP and your devices might break and stop resolving entirely
- DNS-over-HTTPS upstream encryption is optional, not automatic. If you point AGH to a plain text resolver, you still leak. Most beginners misconfigure upstreams.
AdGuard the default good choice for home networks unless your threat model demands full threat intelligence or mobility. When you run it right your DNS never touches a corporate resolver. That’s real privacy. Local first. Self owned.
NextDNS: The Global Shield
NextDNS is the traveler. It’s a hosted DNS firewall that follows you across every device. No home server, no upkeep, no local logs to manage. You sign up, configure filters in a web dashboard, and point your devices to your unique endpoint. NextDNS fits the modern privacy realist. You need protection on the move. You want fast setup. You want analytics but not self hosting headaches. You’re trading hardware control for encrypted portability. That’s fine as long as you understand what you’re giving up. As with everything it is going to depend on your own threat model and level of comfort.
Strengths:
- Industry grade threat intelligence
- Advanced blocklists
- Per device analytics (if logs are enabled, obviously…)
- Strong filtering for mobile telemetry
- DNSSEC, DoT, DoH everywhere
- No hardware required
Weaknesses:
- You’re trusting an external resolver. Even if you tell them to not keep logs or they are anonymized, you still depend on someone else’s infrastructure.
- If DoH or VPN fails, your device leaks unless the OS is configured to block fallback resolvers.
- No offline fallback. If their endpoint fails, you lose DNS.
- Free plan limits at 300,000 queries per month
Instead of running a DNS firewall at home, you route your queries to a global resolver with serious threat intel behind it. You trade local autonomy for filtering power at scale. It’s not just blocklists. It’s telemetry signatures, CDN pattern detection, fingerprinting heuristics, third party threat feeds, and real time updates across global infrastructure.
This matters. Modern surveillance doesn’t come from ads. It comes from SDKs, CDNs, app telemetry, and cross-app identifiers. Scale beats hobby lists. If you live your life on a phone or move across networks constantly, NextDNS is the strongest play.
Adding a Recursive Resolver (Unbound)
AdGuard Home doesn’t ship with a recursive resolver. It forwards to whatever upstream you pick. Cloudflare. Quad9. NextDNS. Or your own.
Adding your own recursive resolver (like Unbound on a ZeroSentinel node) gives you:
- Full DNSSEC validation
- No third party resolvers
- No silent ISP rewrites
- Zero external logs (make sure you disable query logging)
Downside:
- Higher CPU load
- No threat intelligence
- Slower first queries
- More maintenance
This is for autonomy, not convenience.
Stacking for Power
The real strength is knowing how to layer them.
AdGuard Home + Unbound = Full Sovereignty
The gold standard for self hosted DNS.
Flow: Device -> AdGuard (filters) -> Unbound (resolves recursively) -> Root servers
Why it wins
- 100% local.
- No third-party resolver.
- No external logs.
- Resilient even during outages.
This is what trust no one looks like in practice. You’re responsible for uptime, and that’s the trade.
AdGuard Home + NextDNS = Encrypted Hybrid
A modern balance of control and portability.
Flow: Device -> AdGuard (filters) -> NextDNS (encrypted upstream resolver)
Why it wins
- Local blocking with global encryption.
- Centralized analytics from NextDNS.
- Seamless coverage across devices when you leave home.
You still own your LAN level logs and blocklists. You just outsource the tunnel. This is the best of both worlds stack for 90% of people.
Unbound + NextDNS = Smart Cache
Unbound becomes a local forwarder instead of a recursive resolver. It caches queries but still sends them to NextDNS.
When it’s useful
- You want local caching and a fallback if NextDNS fails.
- You want to handle encryption locally (DoH/DoT in Unbound).
Otherwise, it’s just redundancy without extra privacy.
So Which Stack Do You Need?
| Goal | Best Stack |
|---|---|
| Total self reliance, zero trust | AdGuard Home + Unbound |
| Local filtering + cloud analytics | AdGuard Home + NextDNS |
| Maximum portability (no server) | NextDNS alone |
If you live mostly at home or run a small network go with AdGuard and Unbound, or go with a full privacy node like ZeroSentinel. If you travel alot and move between networks then NextDNS will follow you. If you want both, stack them smart. Have your desktop run local only and your mobile phone on NextDNS. The choice is yours.
Resilience and Redundancy
What happens when something fails?
- AdGuard goes down? Your devices lose DNS unless you configured a fallback.
- NextDNS endpoint unreachable? Your encrypted resolver fails silently.
- Both combined? One covers the other.
Resilience is the hidden advantage of running both. You build a layered network that doesn’t die with one misconfig or outage. Redundancy is survival
Practical Setup (No Overkill)
If you want a balanced setup that just works:
- Install AdGuard on a local device.
- Use Unbound locally for recursive resolution.
- On your phone and laptop, install the NextDNS app or set it as your system DoH provider.
Your desktop, smart TV, and IoT devices stay local only. Mobile flexes as needed. No unencrypted DNS leaks. No dependency on Google or Cloudflare defaults.
Final Word
This is about autonomy. Unbound is freedom from outside eyes. AdGuard is control inside your walls. NextDNS is defense in motion.
Use one. Use two. Use all three. Just don’t keep using your ISP’s resolver and call it fine. Owning your DNS is the first real act of rebellion most people can take. It’s quiet, it’s technical, and it cuts the cord where surveillance starts.
Claw it back.
-GHOST
Written by GHOST, creator of the Untraceable Digital Dissident project.
This is part of the Untraceable Digital Dissident series — tactical privacy for creators and rebels.
Explore more privacy tactics at untraceabledigitaldissident.com.
- Browse the full Network Privacy Hub – Kill DNS leaks, VPN failures, and ISP logging.
- Operational Privacy: From Setup to System