Disclosure: NxValue Stack publishes this guide and is one of the options compared. We've tried to be fair, including about where it is not the best choice. Plans and prices change often, so check each vendor's site for current details.

Every "private DNS" option answers the same basic question: who handles your DNS queries, and what do they see? The differences come down to who runs the server, what the filtering can do, what it costs in money or time, and how much you have to trust someone else.

This guide compares the four names people ask about most, and adds a managed option for people who want a private resolver without running one.

The short version

• Easiest and lowest cost: NextDNS or AdGuard DNS, both with free tiers.
• Most control and flexibility for a technical user: Control D (hosted) or a self-hosted Pi-hole or AdGuard Home.
• Queries never leave infrastructure you control: self-hosted Pi-hole or AdGuard Home.
• Private, isolated node without running hardware: a managed single-tenant node such as NxValue Stack.

How these fall into two groups

Self-hosted software (Pi-hole, AdGuard Home) runs on a machine you control: a Raspberry Pi, a home server, or a VPS. You own the data and the maintenance.

Hosted services (NextDNS, Control D, AdGuard DNS) run on the provider's servers. You paste an address into your device and manage settings in a web dashboard. They are shared, multi-tenant platforms: your queries are processed on infrastructure used by many customers, and you rely on the provider's logging and retention policy.

A managed node sits between the two: someone else runs the server, but it is dedicated to you.

Pi-hole (self-hosted)

What it is: Free, open-source DNS filtering software. Devices ask it for a domain, and it blocks anything on your blocklists.

Strengths

• Free software, with a large community and plenty of documentation.
• Your query logs stay on your own hardware.
• Pairs well with Unbound for fully recursive resolution (see our Pi-hole with Unbound guide).

Trade-offs

• You need a machine that is always on, plus updates and monitoring.
• It does not serve DoT or DoH itself, so encrypting the path from your phone needs a TLS proxy, a certificate, and open ports.
• Away from home, you need a VPN back to your network or a publicly reachable server.
• If the machine goes down, your DNS goes down with it.

Cost: free software; you pay with hardware or a server and your time.

Best for: people who enjoy running their own infrastructure and want complete control.

AdGuard Home (self-hosted)

What it is: Free, open-source, self-hosted DNS filtering from the AdGuard team, similar in purpose to Pi-hole.

Strengths

• Supports encrypted DNS (DoH, DoT, DoQ) natively, which removes much of the proxy work Pi-hole needs.
• Per-client settings and a clean interface.

Trade-offs

• Same hosting, upkeep and availability burden as Pi-hole.
• A smaller ecosystem of community guides than Pi-hole.

Cost: free software; you pay with hardware or a server and your time.

Best for: self-hosters who want built-in encrypted DNS.

NextDNS (hosted)

What it is: A cloud DNS filtering service with a polished dashboard, logs, per-profile settings, and DoH/DoT support.

Strengths

• Easy setup across phones, laptops and routers, with good analytics.
• Configurable logging, so you can choose retention or turn logs off.
• A free tier makes it easy to try.

Trade-offs

• It is a shared service, so you trust the provider's handling of your queries.
• The free tier is capped at 300,000 queries per month. Past that, filtering stops and it behaves like a plain resolver until the month resets, and a busy household can reach the cap.
• The hosted service is not open source.

Cost: free tier, with a low-cost paid plan for unlimited queries.

Best for: most people who want an easy, inexpensive hosted filter.

Control D (hosted)

What it is: A hosted DNS platform from the Windscribe team, with deep customization and traffic redirection features.

Strengths

• Broad protocol support: DoH, DoH3, DoT and DoQ.
• Per-device profiles, geo-based rules, and the ability to redirect or unblock specific services.
• Free public resolvers are available without an account.

Trade-offs

• The advanced controls need a paid plan.
• The core service is closed source, and the redirect features mean trusting the provider with more of your traffic.
• More options also means more to configure.

Cost: free public resolvers, with paid plans for custom rules and analytics.

Best for: power users who want fine-grained control and don't mind a hosted service.

AdGuard DNS (hosted)

What it is: AdGuard's cloud DNS service. It has a free public resolver and a paid tier with custom rules, logs and dashboards.

Strengths

• The easiest start: no software to install.
• Supports DoH, DoT, DoQ and DNSCrypt, and the server code is open source.
• A free Starter plan makes it easy to try.

Trade-offs

• The free plan is limited in queries (300,000 per month), devices and rules.
• A hosted resolver processes your queries.

Cost: free tier, with a low-cost paid plan for higher limits.

Best for: people who want the quickest setup and are fine with a hosted provider.

NxValue Stack (managed single-tenant node)

What it is: A private Pi-hole and Unbound node provisioned for you alone. It is not a shared resolver: you get an isolated server with DoH and DoT endpoints ready to paste into your device.

Strengths

• Single-tenant: your queries and logs live on your own node, not in a shared pipeline.
• Recursive by default: Unbound resolves directly from the root servers with DNSSEC validation, so there is no public resolver in the middle.
• Your data stays yours: export the full database and logs at any time, and the data is destroyed with the node.
• No per-query cap: because the node is yours, there is no monthly query limit, only a fair-use policy.
• Open-source parts: stock Pi-hole and Unbound.

Trade-offs

• No free tier, so it costs more than the free plans above.
• It is stock Pi-hole, so you get Pi-hole's filtering model without the polished profile systems, parental scheduling and routing tricks of Control D or NextDNS.
• It is a new, small operator, so you are trusting that operator with your DNS. The isolation helps, but it does not remove the need for trust.
• If your node is unavailable, queries fall back to a public upstream until it recovers.

Cost: $4/month on the BASE-N plan, billed hourly, cancel anytime.

Best for: people who want a private Pi-hole and Unbound without hardware, port forwarding, certificates or maintenance, and who value data export and isolation over a feature-rich dashboard.

What none of these do

• Hide the IPs you connect to. Encrypted DNS stops your ISP and local network from reading your lookups, but they can still see the addresses you visit.
• Make DNS lookups anonymous. With a forwarding resolver, one provider sees your queries. With Unbound, authoritative servers see the questions they are responsible for, and those upstream lookups are not encrypted.
• Block every ad. Video ads on YouTube or Twitch come from the same domains as the content, so DNS filtering can't remove them. Pair DNS blocking with a browser content blocker.

Which should you choose?

Price differences here are small. Most hosted options cost a few dollars a month or less, and self-hosting is free software that costs your time, so the choice is mostly about trust, control and effort.

• You want it free and easy: NextDNS or AdGuard DNS.
• You want maximum control: Control D.
• You want everything on your own hardware: Pi-hole or AdGuard Home.
• You want a private Pi-hole and Unbound node without running it yourself: a managed single-tenant node such as NxValue Stack. You can try the demo node here.

There is no single best answer. Pick based on whose servers you are comfortable with, how much time you want to spend, and what you actually need to block.

Pi-hole is a registered trademark of Pi-hole LLC. NxValue Stack is an independent service provider and is not affiliated with Pi-hole LLC, NextDNS, Control D, or AdGuard. All other names are trademarks of their respective owners.