In an era where data privacy is paramount, controlling your own DNS resolution is one of the most impactful steps a homelabber can take. Here is how I achieved a fully recursive, ad-blocking setup.
Prerequisites
Unraid server, Docker knowledge, basic networking understanding
My setup
As you may know from reading my other post I run Unraid, this software is the backbone of my homelab. So for me it only made sense to run my own DNS locally. I have run multiple Docker and LXC containers, and found that they have all missed something, or was not maintained well enough. As a result decided to run seperate Docker containers for each service.
I setup the Official Unbound container and the Official Adguard Home container all under their own ip address using the br0 network mode. Using br0 gives them dedicated IPs, making firewall rules and monitoring easier
Then i pointed the Adguard Home instance to the Unbound as the upstream resolution. At this point i would recommend using a second machine, even a rasberry Pi, to do the same as a fallback, as if your main server fails or goes offline, your whole network stays up.
The Filtering Layer: AdGuard Home
You may have heard of Pi-Hole, a network wide ad blocker, well Adguard Home is a great alternative offering the same or in some cases similar features.
The best feature which Pi-Hole has not got, is a built in blocklist menu. Simply select which ones suit you from the add blocklist button.

The Recursive Engine: Unbound
Unlike many DNS servers you may run locally, Unbound is a full recursive Solution, meaning it will talk directly to the root servers rather than to another upstream DNS server. There is no GUI (Graphical User Interface) to manage which with the help of a well-known chatbot, i was able to get the configuration working well. I believe my config will help you well. I have disabled the forwarding and local zone records (A records), at the bottom of the file by commenting them out, because i don’t use them.
server:
###########################################################################
# BASIC SETTINGS
###########################################################################
# Time to live maximum for RRsets and messages in the cache. If the maximum
# kicks in, responses to clients still get decrementing TTLs based on the
# original (larger) values. When the internal TTL expires, the cache item
# has expired. Can be set lower to force the resolver to query for data
# often, and not trust (very large) TTL values.
cache-max-ttl: 86400
# Time to live minimum for RRsets and messages in the cache. If the minimum
# kicks in, the data is cached for longer than the domain owner intended,
# and thus less queries are made to look up the data. Zero makes sure the
# data in the cache is as the domain owner intended, higher values,
# especially more than an hour or so, can lead to trouble as the data in
# the cache does not match up with the actual data any more.
cache-min-ttl: 300
# Set the working directory for the program.
directory: "/opt/unbound/etc/unbound"
# RFC 6891. Number of bytes size to advertise as the EDNS reassembly buffer
# size. This is the value put into datagrams over UDP towards peers.
# The actual buffer size is determined by msg-buffer-size (both for TCP and
# UDP). Do not set higher than that value.
# Default is 1232 which is the DNS Flag Day 2020 recommendation.
# Setting to 512 bypasses even the most stringent path MTU problems, but
# is seen as extreme, since the amount of TCP fallback generated is
# excessive (probably also for this resolver, consider tuning the outgoing
# tcp number).
edns-buffer-size: 1232
# Listen to for queries from clients and answer from this network interface
# and port.
interface: 0.0.0.0@53
# Rotates RRSet order in response (the pseudo-random number is taken from
# the query ID, for speed and thread safety).
rrset-roundrobin: yes
# Drop user privileges after binding the port.
username: "_unbound"
###########################################################################
# LOGGING
###########################################################################
# Do not print log lines to inform about local zone actions
log-local-actions: no
# Do not print one line per query to the log
log-queries: no
# Do not print one line per reply to the log
log-replies: no
# Do not print log lines that say why queries return SERVFAIL to clients
log-servfail: no
# Further limit logging
logfile: ""
# Only log errors
verbosity: 0
###########################################################################
# PRIVACY SETTINGS
###########################################################################
# RFC 8198. Use the DNSSEC NSEC chain to synthesize NXDO-MAIN and other
# denials, using information from previous NXDO-MAINs answers. In other
# words, use cached NSEC records to generate negative answers within a
# range and positive answers from wildcards. This increases performance,
# decreases latency and resource utilization on both authoritative and
# recursive servers, and increases privacy. Also, it may help increase
# resilience to certain DoS attacks in some circumstances.
aggressive-nsec: yes
# Extra delay for timeouted UDP ports before they are closed, in msec.
# This prevents very delayed answer packets from the upstream (recursive)
# servers from bouncing against closed ports and setting off all sort of
# close-port counters, with eg. 1500 msec. When timeouts happen you need
# extra sockets, it checks the ID and remote IP of packets, and unwanted
# packets are added to the unwanted packet counter.
delay-close: 10000
# Prevent the unbound server from forking into the background as a daemon
do-daemonize: no
# Add localhost to the do-not-query-address list.
do-not-query-localhost: no
# Number of bytes size of the aggressive negative cache.
neg-cache-size: 4M
# Send minimum amount of information to upstream servers to enhance
# privacy (best privacy).
qname-minimisation: yes
###########################################################################
# SECURITY SETTINGS
###########################################################################
# Only give access to recursion clients from LAN IPs
access-control: 127.0.0.1/32 allow
access-control: 192.168.0.0/16 allow
access-control: 172.16.0.0/12 allow
access-control: 10.0.0.0/8 allow
# access-control: fc00::/7 allow
# access-control: ::1/128 allow
# File with trust anchor for one zone, which is tracked with RFC5011
# probes.
auto-trust-anchor-file: "var/root.key"
# Enable chroot (i.e, change apparent root directory for the current
# running process and its children)
chroot: "/opt/unbound/etc/unbound"
# Deny queries of type ANY with an empty response.
deny-any: yes
# Harden against algorithm downgrade when multiple algorithms are
# advertised in the DS record.
harden-algo-downgrade: yes
# RFC 8020. returns nxdomain to queries for a name below another name that
# is already known to be nxdomain.
harden-below-nxdomain: yes
# Require DNSSEC data for trust-anchored zones, if such data is absent, the
# zone becomes bogus. If turned off you run the risk of a downgrade attack
# that disables security for a zone.
harden-dnssec-stripped: yes
# Only trust glue if it is within the servers authority.
harden-glue: yes
# Ignore very large queries.
harden-large-queries: yes
# Perform additional queries for infrastructure data to harden the referral
# path. Validates the replies if trust anchors are configured and the zones
# are signed. This enforces DNSSEC validation on nameserver NS sets and the
# nameserver addresses that are encountered on the referral path to the
# answer. Experimental option.
harden-referral-path: no
# Ignore very small EDNS buffer sizes from queries.
harden-short-bufsize: yes
# Refuse id.server and hostname.bind queries
hide-identity: yes
# Refuse version.server and version.bind queries
hide-version: yes
# Report this identity rather than the hostname of the server.
identity: "DNS"
# These private network addresses are not allowed to be returned for public
# internet names. Any occurrence of such addresses are removed from DNS
# answers. Additionally, the DNSSEC validator may mark the answers bogus.
# This protects against DNS Rebinding
private-address: 10.0.0.0/8
private-address: 172.16.0.0/12
private-address: 192.168.0.0/16
private-address: 169.254.0.0/16
# private-address: fd00::/8
# private-address: fe80::/10
# private-address: ::ffff:0:0/96
# Enable ratelimiting of queries (per second) sent to nameserver for
# performing recursion. More queries are turned away with an error
# (servfail). This stops recursive floods (e.g., random query names), but
# not spoofed reflection floods. Cached responses are not rate limited by
# this setting. Experimental option.
ratelimit: 1000
# Use this certificate bundle for authenticating connections made to
# outside peers (e.g., auth-zone urls, DNS over TLS connections).
tls-cert-bundle: /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
# Set the total number of unwanted replies to eep track of in every thread.
# When it reaches the threshold, a defensive action of clearing the rrset
# and message caches is taken, hopefully flushing away any poison.
# Unbound suggests a value of 10 million.
unwanted-reply-threshold: 10000
# Use 0x20-encoded random bits in the query to foil spoof attempts. This
# perturbs the lowercase and uppercase of query names sent to authority
# servers and checks if the reply still has the correct casing.
# This feature is an experimental implementation of draft dns-0x20.
# Experimental option.
use-caps-for-id: yes
# Help protect users that rely on this validator for authentication from
# potentially bad data in the additional section. Instruct the validator to
# remove data from the additional section of secure messages that are not
# signed properly. Messages that are insecure, bogus, indeterminate or
# unchecked are not affected.
val-clean-additional: yes
###########################################################################
# PERFORMANCE SETTINGS
###########################################################################
# https://nlnetlabs.nl/documentation/unbound/howto-optimise/
# https://nlnetlabs.nl/news/2019/Feb/05/unbound-1.9.0-released/
# Number of slabs in the infrastructure cache. Slabs reduce lock contention
# by threads. Must be set to a power of 2.
infra-cache-slabs: 16
# Number of incoming TCP buffers to allocate per thread. Default
# is 10. If set to 0, or if do-tcp is "no", no TCP queries from
# clients are accepted. For larger installations increasing this
# value is a good idea.
incoming-num-tcp: 10
# Number of slabs in the key cache. Slabs reduce lock contention by
# threads. Must be set to a power of 2. Setting (close) to the number
# of cpus is a reasonable guess.
key-cache-slabs: 16
# Number of bytes size of the message cache.
# Unbound recommendation is to Use roughly twice as much rrset cache memory
# as you use msg cache memory.
msg-cache-size: 4508979882
# Number of slabs in the message cache. Slabs reduce lock contention by
# threads. Must be set to a power of 2. Setting (close) to the number of
# cpus is a reasonable guess.
msg-cache-slabs: 16
# The number of queries that every thread will service simultaneously. If
# more queries arrive that need servicing, and no queries can be jostled
# out (see jostle-timeout), then the queries are dropped.
# This is best set at half the number of the outgoing-range.
# This Unbound instance was compiled with libevent so it can efficiently
# use more than 1024 file descriptors.
num-queries-per-thread: 4096
# The number of threads to create to serve clients.
# This is set dynamically at run time to effectively use available CPUs
# resources
num-threads: 4
# Number of ports to open. This number of file descriptors can be opened
# per thread.
# This Unbound instance was compiled with libevent so it can efficiently
# use more than 1024 file descriptors.
outgoing-range: 8192
# Number of bytes size of the RRset cache.
# Use roughly twice as much rrset cache memory as msg cache memory
rrset-cache-size: 9017959765
# Number of slabs in the RRset cache. Slabs reduce lock contention by
# threads. Must be set to a power of 2.
rrset-cache-slabs: 16
# Do no insert authority/additional sections into response messages when
# those sections are not required. This reduces response size
# significantly, and may avoid TCP fallback for some responses. This may
# cause a slight speedup.
minimal-responses: yes
# # Fetch the DNSKEYs earlier in the validation process, when a DS record
# is encountered. This lowers the latency of requests at the expense of
# little more CPU usage.
prefetch: yes
# Fetch the DNSKEYs earlier in the validation process, when a DS record is
# encountered. This lowers the latency of requests at the expense of little
# more CPU usage.
prefetch-key: yes
# Have unbound attempt to serve old responses from cache with a TTL of 0 in
# the response without waiting for the actual resolution to finish. The
# actual resolution answer ends up in the cache later on.
serve-expired: yes
# Open dedicated listening sockets for incoming queries for each thread and
# try to set the SO_REUSEPORT socket option on each socket. May distribute
# incoming queries to threads more evenly.
so-reuseport: yes
###########################################################################
# LOCAL ZONE
###########################################################################
# Include file for local-data and local-data-ptr
# include: /opt/unbound/etc/unbound/a-records.conf
# include: /opt/unbound/etc/unbound/srv-records.conf
###########################################################################
# FORWARD ZONE
###########################################################################
# include: /opt/unbound/etc/unbound/forward-records.conf
remote-control:
control-enable: no
The way this works is is Your computer (the client), sends the request to Adguard Home for filtering and then sent to Unboud. Unbound then speaks to the DNS server for the IP address so your computer knows where to go.
Here is a diagram below.

To test if unbound is running the DNSSEC properly run this command, replacing the <UNBOUND_IP> with the ip address of your unbound server (eg. 192.168.0.2).
dig @<UNBOUND_IP> dnssec-failed.org +dnssecThen run the command below to confirm that it is resolving a proper DNSSEC
dig @<UNBOUND_IP> cloudflare.com +dnssecWhy This Architecture Works
I love the idea that it is private and not sent to a 3rd party, and for a local environment it is responsive and easy to manage and update. I especially like that Unbound has a local cache in-memory to make the return to any site you visit a bit faster. AdGuard Home may not be as rich in features as Pi-Hole but it is a good trade-off to have the most popular blocklists built in and constantly updated. As mentions before, using them as separate official containers i am reassured to know that the will be kept updated to the latest version, providing any security updates and features that may come in the future.


