Welcome to the Mullvad VPN client app source code repository. This is the VPN client software for the Mullvad VPN service. For more information about the service, please visit our website, mullvad.net (Also accessible via Tor on our onion service).
This repository contains all the source code for the
desktop and mobile versions of the app. For desktop this includes the system service/daemon
(mullvad-daemon
), a graphical user interface (GUI) and a
command line interface (CLI). The Android app uses the same backing
system service for the tunnel and security but has a dedicated frontend in android/.
iOS consists of a completely standalone implementation that resides in ios/.
There are built and signed releases for macOS, Windows, Linux and Android available on our website and on Github. The Android app is also available on Google Play and F-Droid and the iOS version on App Store.
You can find our code signing keys as well as instructions for how to cryptographically verify your download on Mullvad's Open Source page.
These are the operating systems and their versions that the app officially supports. It might work on many more versions, but we don't test for those and can't guarantee the quality or security.
OS/Platform | Supported versions |
---|---|
Windows | 10 and 11 |
macOS | The three latest major releases |
Linux (Ubuntu) | The two latest LTS releases and the latest non-LTS releases |
Linux (Fedora) | The versions that are not yet EOL |
Linux (Debian) | 11 and newer |
Android | 8 and newer |
iOS | 13 and newer |
On Linux we test using the Gnome desktop environment. The app should, and probably does work in other DEs, but we don't regularly test those.
Here is a table containing the features of the app across platforms. This is intended to reflect the current state of the latest code in git, not necessarily any existing release.
Windows | Linux | macOS | Android | iOS | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
OpenVPN | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ||
WireGuard | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Quantum-resistant tunnels | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | |
WireGuard multihop | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ||
WireGuard over TCP | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | |
OpenVPN over Shadowsocks | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ||
Split tunneling | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ||
Custom DNS server | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Content blockers (Ads etc) | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Optional local network access | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓* |
Externally audited | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
* The local network is always accessible on iOS with the current implementation
This app is a privacy preserving VPN client. As such it goes to great lengths to stop traffic leaks. And basically all settings default to the more secure/private option. The user has to explicitly allow more loose rules if desired. See the dedicated security document for details on what the app blocks and allows, as well as how it does it.
This repository contains submodules needed for building the app. However, some of those submodules also have further submodules that are quite large and not needed to build the app. So unless you want the source code for OpenSSL, OpenVPN and a few other projects you should avoid a recursive clone of the repository. Instead clone the repository normally and then get one level of submodules:
git clone https://github.com/mullvad/mullvadvpn-app.git
cd mullvadvpn-app
git submodule update --init
We sign every commit on the main
branch as well as our release tags. If you would like to verify
your checkout, you can find our developer keys on Mullvad's Open Source page.
This repository has a git submodule at dist-assets/binaries
. This submodule contains binaries and
build scripts for third party code we need to bundle with the app. Such as OpenVPN, Wintun
etc.
This submodule conforms to the same integrity/security standards as this repository. Every merge commit should be signed. And this main repository should only ever point to a signed merge commit of the binaries submodule.
See the binaries submodule's README for more details about that repository.
See the build instructions for help building the app on desktop platforms.
For building the Android app, see the instructions for Android.
For building the iOS app, see the instructions for iOS.
See this for instructions on how to make a new release.
-
TALPID_FIREWALL_DEBUG
- Helps debugging the firewall. Does different things depending on platform:- Linux: Set to
"1"
to add packet counters to all firewall rules. - macOS: Makes rules log the packets they match to the
pflog0
interface.- Set to
"all"
to add logging to all rules. - Set to
"pass"
to add logging to rules allowing packets. - Set to
"drop"
to add logging to rules blocking packets.
- Set to
- Linux: Set to
-
TALPID_FIREWALL_DONT_SET_SRC_VALID_MARK
- Forces the daemon to not setsrc_valid_mark
config on Linux. The kernel config option is set because otherwise strict reverse path filtering may prevent relay traffic from reaching the daemon. Ifrp_filter
is set to1
on the interface that will be receiving relay traffic, andsrc_valid_mark
is not set to1
, the daemon will not be able to receive relay traffic. -
TALPID_DNS_MODULE
- Allows changing the method that will be used for DNS configuration. By default this is automatically detected, but you can set it to one of the options below to choose a specific method.-
Linux
"static-file"
: change the/etc/resolv.conf
file directly"resolvconf"
: use theresolvconf
program"systemd"
: use systemd'sresolved
service through DBus"network-manager"
: useNetworkManager
service through DBus
-
Windows
iphlpapi
: use the IP helper APInetsh
: use thenetsh
programtcpip
: set TCP/IP parameters in the registry
-
-
TALPID_FORCE_USERSPACE_WIREGUARD
- Forces the daemon to use the userspace implementation of WireGuard on Linux. -
TALPID_DISABLE_OFFLINE_MONITOR
- Forces the daemon to always assume the host is online. -
TALPID_NET_CLS_MOUNT_DIR
- On Linux, forces the daemon to mount thenet_cls
controller in the specified directory if it isn't mounted already. -
MULLVAD_MANAGEMENT_SOCKET_GROUP
- On Linux and macOS, this restricts access to the management interface UDS socket to users in the specified group. This means that only users in that group can use the CLI and GUI. By default, everyone has access to the socket.
-
MULLVAD_API_HOST
- Set the hostname to use in API requests. E.g.api.mullvad.net
. -
MULLVAD_API_ADDR
- Set the IP address and port to use in API requests. E.g.10.10.1.2:443
. -
MULLVAD_API_DISABLE_TLS
- Use plain HTTP for API requests. -
MULLVAD_CONNCHECK_HOST
- Set the hostname to use in connection check requests. E.g.am.i.mullvad.net
.
Use setx
from an elevated shell:
setx TALPID_DISABLE_OFFLINE 1 /m
For the change to take effect, restart the daemon:
sc.exe stop mullvadvpn
sc.exe start mullvadvpn
Edit the systemd unit file via systemctl edit mullvad-daemon.service
:
[Service]
Environment="TALPID_DISABLE_OFFLINE_MONITOR=1"
For the change to take effect, restart the daemon:
sudo systemctl restart mullvad-daemon
Use launchctl
:
sudo launchctl setenv TALPID_DISABLE_OFFLINE_MONITOR 1
For the change to take effect, restart the daemon:
launchctl unload -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/net.mullvad.daemon.plist
launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/net.mullvad.daemon.plist
MULLVAD_PATH
- Allows changing the path to the folder with themullvad-problem-report
tool when running in development mode. Defaults to:<repo>/target/debug/
.MULLVAD_DISABLE_UPDATE_NOTIFICATION
- If set to1
, GUI notification will be disabled when an update is available.
$ npm run develop
- develop app with live-reload enabled$ npm run lint
- lint code$ npm run pack:<OS>
- prepare app for distribution for your platform. Where<OS>
can belinux
,mac
orwin
$ npm test
- run tests
The requirements for displaying a tray icon varies between different desktop environments. If the tray icon doesn't appear, try installing one of these packages:
libappindicator3-1
libappindicator1
libappindicator
If you're using GNOME, try installing one of these GNOME Shell extensions:
TopIconsFix
TopIcons Plus
- gui/
- assets/ - Graphical assets and stylesheets
- src/
- main/
- index.ts - Entry file for the main process
- renderer/
- app.tsx - Entry file for the renderer process
- routes.tsx - Routes configurator
- transitions.ts - Transition rules between views
- config.json - App color definitions and URLs to external resources
- main/
- tasks/ - Gulp tasks used to build app and watch for changes during development
- distribution.js - Configuration for
electron-builder
- distribution.js - Configuration for
- test/ - Electron GUI tests
- dist-assets/ - Icons, binaries and other files used when creating the distributables
- binaries/ - Git submodule containing binaries bundled with the app. For example the statically linked OpenVPN binary. See the README in the submodule for details
- linux/ - Scripts and configuration files for the deb and rpm artifacts
- pkg-scripts/ - Scripts bundled with and executed by the macOS pkg installer
- windows/ - Windows NSIS installer configuration and assets
- ca.crt - The Mullvad relay server root CA. Bundled with the app and only OpenVPN relays signed by this CA are trusted
- build-windows-modules.sh - Compiles the C++ libraries needed on Windows
- build.sh - Sanity checks the working directory state and then builds installers for the app
The daemon is implemented in Rust and is implemented in several crates. The main, or top level,
crate that builds the final daemon binary is mullvad-daemon
which then depend on the others.
In general one can look at the daemon as split into two parts, the crates starting with talpid
and the crates starting with mullvad
. The talpid
crates are supposed to be completely unrelated
to Mullvad specific things. A talpid
crate is not allowed to know anything about the API through
which the daemon fetch Mullvad account details or download VPN server lists for example. The
talpid
components should be viewed as a generic VPN client with extra privacy and anonymity
preserving features. The crates having mullvad
in their name on the other hand make use of the
talpid
components to build a secure and Mullvad specific VPN client.
- Cargo.toml - Main Rust workspace definition. See this file for which folders here are daemon Rust crates.
- mullvad-daemon/ - Main Rust crate building the daemon binary.
- talpid-core/ - Main crate of the VPN client implementation itself. Completely Mullvad agnostic privacy preserving VPN client library.
Explanations for some common words used in the documentation and code in this repository.
- App - This entire product (everything in this repository) is the "Mullvad VPN App", or App for
short.
- Daemon - Refers to the
mullvad-daemon
Rust program. This headless program exposes a management interface that can be used to control the daemon - Frontend - Term used for any program or component that connects to the daemon management
interface and allows a user to control the daemon.
- GUI - The Electron + React program that is a graphical frontend for the Mullvad VPN App.
- CLI - The Rust program named
mullvad
that is a terminal based frontend for the Mullvad VPN app.
- Daemon - Refers to the
A list of file paths written to and read from by the various components of the Mullvad VPN app
On Windows, when a process runs as a system service the variable %LOCALAPPDATA%
expands to
C:\Windows\system32\config\systemprofile\AppData\Local
.
All directory paths are defined in, and fetched from, the mullvad-paths
crate.
The settings directory can be changed by setting the MULLVAD_SETTINGS_DIR
environment variable.
Platform | Path |
---|---|
Linux | /etc/mullvad-vpn/ |
macOS | /etc/mullvad-vpn/ |
Windows | %LOCALAPPDATA%\Mullvad VPN\ |
Android | /data/data/net.mullvad.mullvadvpn/ |
The log directory can be changed by setting the MULLVAD_LOG_DIR
environment variable.
Platform | Path |
---|---|
Linux | /var/log/mullvad-vpn/ + systemd |
macOS | /var/log/mullvad-vpn/ |
Windows | C:\ProgramData\Mullvad VPN\ |
Android | /data/data/net.mullvad.mullvadvpn/ |
The cache directory can be changed by setting the MULLVAD_CACHE_DIR
environment variable.
Platform | Path |
---|---|
Linux | /var/cache/mullvad-vpn/ |
macOS | /Library/Caches/mullvad-vpn/ |
Windows | C:\ProgramData\Mullvad VPN\cache |
Android | /data/data/net.mullvad.mullvadvpn/cache |
The full path to the RPC address file can be changed by setting the MULLVAD_RPC_SOCKET_PATH
environment variable.
Platform | Path |
---|---|
Linux | /var/run/mullvad-vpn |
macOS | /var/run/mullvad-vpn |
Windows | //./pipe/Mullvad VPN |
Android | /data/data/net.mullvad.mullvadvpn/rpc-socket |
The GUI has a specific settings file that is configured for each user. The path is set in the
gui/packages/desktop/main/gui-settings.ts
file.
Platform | Path |
---|---|
Linux | $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/Mullvad VPN/gui_settings.json |
macOS | ~/Library/Application Support/Mullvad VPN/gui_settings.json |
Windows | %LOCALAPPDATA%\Mullvad VPN\gui_settings.json |
Android | Present in Android's logcat |
See graphics README for information about icons.
Instructions for how to handle locales and translations are found here.
For instructions specific to the Android app, see here.
Mullvad has used external pentesting companies to carry out security audits of this VPN app. Read more about them in the audits readme.
Copyright (C) 2022 Mullvad VPN AB
This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
For the full license agreement, see the LICENSE.md file
The source code for the iOS app is GPL-3 licensed like everything else in this repository. But the distributed app on the Apple App Store is not GPL licensed, it falls under the Apple App Store EULA.