The wsl-vpnkit script uses VPNKit and npiperelay to provide network connectivity to the WSL 2 VM while connected to VPNs on the Windows host. This requires no settings changes or admin privileges on the Windows host.
The releases bundle the script together with VPNKit and npiperelay in an Alpine distro.
Download the prebuilt file wsl-vpnkit.tar.gz from the latest release and import the distro into WSL 2. Running the distro will show a short intro and exit.
# PowerShell
wsl --import wsl-vpnkit $env:USERPROFILE\wsl-vpnkit wsl-vpnkit.tar.gz --version 2
wsl -d wsl-vpnkitStart wsl-vpnkit from your other WSL 2 distros. Add the command to your .profile or .bashrc to start wsl-vpnkit when you open your WSL terminal.
wsl.exe -d wsl-vpnkit service wsl-vpnkit start- Ports on the WSL 2 VM are accessible from the Windows host using
localhost. - Ports on the Windows host are accessible from WSL 2 using
host.internal,192.168.67.2, or the IP address of the host machine.
To update, unregister the existing distro and import the new version.
# PowerShell
wsl --unregister wsl-vpnkit
wsl --import wsl-vpnkit $env:USERPROFILE\wsl-vpnkit wsl-vpnkit.tar.gzTo uninstall, unregister the distro.
# PowerShell
wsl --unregister wsl-vpnkit
rm -r $env:USERPROFILE\wsl-vpnkitThis will build and import the distro.
git clone https://github.com/sakai135/wsl-vpnkit.git
cd wsl-vpnkit/
./distro/test.shThe wsl-vpnkit script can be used as a normal script in your existing distro. This is an example setup script for Ubuntu.
# create the directory to place Windows executables
USERPROFILE=$(wslpath "$(powershell.exe -c 'Write-Host -NoNewline $env:USERPROFILE')")
mkdir -p "$USERPROFILE/wsl-vpnkit"
# install socat and 7z; p7zip-full can be removed after install
sudo apt install p7zip-full socat
# download VPNKit binaries
wget https://github.com/sakai135/vpnkit/releases/download/v0.5.0-20211026/vpnkit-tap-vsockd
wget https://github.com/sakai135/vpnkit/releases/download/v0.5.0-20211026/vpnkit.exe
mv vpnkit.exe "$USERPROFILE/wsl-vpnkit/wsl-vpnkit.exe"
chmod +x vpnkit-tap-vsockd
sudo chown root:root vpnkit-tap-vsockd
sudo mv vpnkit-tap-vsockd /usr/local/sbin/vpnkit-tap-vsockd
# download npiperelay
wget https://github.com/jstarks/npiperelay/releases/download/v0.1.0/npiperelay_windows_amd64.zip
7z e npiperelay_windows_amd64.zip npiperelay.exe
rm npiperelay_windows_amd64.zip
mv npiperelay.exe "$USERPROFILE/wsl-vpnkit/"
# download the wsl-vpnkit script to current directory
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/sakai135/wsl-vpnkit/v0.2.x/wsl-vpnkit
chmod +x wsl-vpnkit
# run the wsl-vpnkit script
sudo ./wsl-vpnkitIf VS Code takes a long time to open your folder in WSL, enable the setting "Connect Through Localhost".
# PowerShell
wsl --shutdown
kill -Name wsl-vpnkit