Entware Pi-hole directly on the router? Yes!

[jacklul]

Well few days in with everything working correctly and gotta say, it's VERY nice having pihole run natively on the router, one less device is always nice!

Has anyone tried using something like the app "Pihole client" on Android? I used it when I was running it on my RPi and it's basically an app that shows all the GUI stats. Used to work fine with the RPi but whenever I enter the details for the router address I either get a "Failed. Unknown Error" using port 5443 or "SSL Error. Check if the servers certificate is valid" using port 5080.

I've tried exporting/importing the cert but that doesn't seem to change anything, I'm sure I'm just an idiot but help would be appreciated

This is over https for reference but I'm sure that's obvious

I just downloaded this app and it connected without any issues.
Remember that 3rd-party apps should use App password from Settings -> API instead of your main password.
Port 5080 is with SSL off, 5443 with SSL on.

 

[heslo]

I just downloaded this app and it connected without any issues.
Remember that 3rd-party apps should use App password from Settings -> API instead of your main password.
Port 5080 is with SSL off, 5443 with SSL on.

Yeah checked all that, it's gotta be an issue with my certificates. I'll have to play around with it more when I've got more time. It's not a deal breaker anyway, just a nice to have

 

[jacklul]

Yeah checked all that, it's gotta be an issue with my certificates. I'll have to play around with it more when I've got more time. It's not a deal breaker anyway, just a nice to have

Pi-hole self-generates SSL certificate, the app has option to allow self-signed certificates - make sure that is on.

 

[heslo]

Pi-hole self-generates SSL certificate, the app has option to allow self-signed certificates - make sure that is on.

Yep, it is

Curiously I've tried another app called "Pi-hole Connect" and it works no issues on port 5443

Using the exact same credentials in "Pi-hole Client" doesn't work

 

[bibikalka]

I just downloaded this app and it connected without any issues.
Remember that 3rd-party apps should use App password from Settings -> API instead of your main password.
Port 5080 is with SSL off, 5443 with SSL on.

This worked for me too, port 80 for my PiHole virtual IP.

 

[bibikalka]

@jacklul

So far ~1 month of operation. All good, reboots daily with the router. Had an issue with clients hitting too many sites at once (Slickdeals in the US!), had to update the limit.

admin@RT-AC86U-9988:/tmp/mnt/ac86u/entware/var/log/pihole# grep rate-limiting FTL.log.1
2025-09-21 11:59:04.327 CDT [5199/T5859] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 2014 queries
2025-09-21 12:00:04.227 CDT [5199/T5859] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 1121 queries
2025-09-21 12:01:04.077 CDT [5199/T5859] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 1173 queries
2025-09-21 12:02:04.387 CDT [5199/T5859] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 1702 queries
2025-09-21 12:03:04.247 CDT [5199/T5859] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 1572 queries
2025-09-21 12:04:04.067 CDT [5199/T5859] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 1419 queries
2025-09-22 08:56:49.431 CDT [3207/T5619] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 1051 queries
2025-09-24 16:27:07.020 CDT [3662/T6728] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 1567 queries
2025-09-24 16:28:07.930 CDT [3662/T6728] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 1367 queries
2025-09-24 16:29:07.760 CDT [3662/T6728] INFO: Still rate-limiting 192.168.1.171 as it made additional 1459 queries

 

[jacklul]

When a client does more than 1000 queries within one minute I would check why is that rather than raising the limit
A common thing causing this might be uBlock/Brave shields making websites to misbehave, investigate on the device itself

 

[heslo]

Been working fine here since we managed to sort out my little issue except sometimes I'll notice RAM usage on the router goes to 99% and everything just stops, need a reboot of the router and it comes back. I also notice sometimes on a fresh reboot this happens but again, another reboot solves the issue. Didn't happen until I set up PiHole on the router, am I just having issues due to a slightly older router (AX88U) or is there an underlying problem/memory leak I've got to deal with here?

 

[jacklul]

Been working fine here since we managed to sort out my little issue except sometimes I'll notice RAM usage on the router goes to 99% and everything just stops, need a reboot of the router and it comes back. I also notice sometimes on a fresh reboot this happens but again, another reboot solves the issue. Didn't happen until I set up PiHole on the router, am I just having issues due to a slightly older router (AX88U) or is there an underlying problem/memory leak I've got to deal with here?

When Pi-hole does database maintenance it loads whole pihole-FTL.db to memory, try reducing number of days for the queries on Settings->Privacy page to reduce file size.
And obviously, gravity update will definitely spike up the memory usage.

 

[heslo]

When Pi-hole does database maintenance it loads whole pihole-FTL.db to memory, try reducing number of days for the queries on Settings->Privacy page to reduce file size.
And obviously, gravity update will definitely spike up the memory usage.

Good tip, I'll give that a go! Any number you recommend?

 

[jacklul]

Good tip, I'll give that a go! Any number you recommend?

I have mine set to 31, that's also now a default when installed through my project, Pi-hole's default is 91.
If you really don't care about the historical data you can just set it to 3-7.

 

[heslo]

I have mine set to 31, that's also now a default when installed through my project, Pi-hole's default is 91.
If you really don't care about the historical data you can just set it to 3-7.

Yeah mine is currently set for 31 as well, I might drop it to 14 and see how I go. Realistically I don't need longer than that anyway

 

[bibikalka]

When a client does more than 1000 queries within one minute I would check why is that rather than raising the limit
A common thing causing this might be uBlock/Brave shields making websites to misbehave, investigate on the device itself

I actually did not have any shields on my Chrome. Went ahead and installed uBlock.

I have a few clients fully unblocked to avoid some sites misbehaving, so I guess a bit of blocking is a good thing.