WireGuide

A cross-platform WireGuard VPN client with modern UI and quality-of-life features.

한국어

Why does this exist?

The official WireGuard macOS client (v1.0.16) hasn't been updated since February 2023. While it works fine for many users with standard setups, there are known issues that remain unpatched — particularly around split DNS, sleep/wake recovery, and missing features like a kill switch.

WireGuide was born out of a specific frustration: the official client caused severe system lag on an M1 MacBook Air after updating to macOS Tahoe, and no fix was available. Rather than waiting, I built an alternative that also adds features the official app doesn't have.

Known issues with the official macOS client

These are documented issues — not all users experience them, but they've been reported and remain unfixed:

What WireGuide adds

• Kill Switch — blocks all non-VPN traffic via macOS pf (optional, off by default)
• DNS Protection — forces DNS queries through VPN only (optional)
• Sleep/Wake Recovery — detects wake events and handles reconnection
• Route Monitor — re-applies endpoint bypass routes on gateway changes
• Config Editor — CodeMirror 6 with WireGuard syntax highlighting and autocompletion
• Drag-and-drop import — drop .conf files to add tunnels
• Health Check — monitors handshake age, triggers reconnect if tunnel is unresponsive (optional, off by default, recommended with PersistentKeepalive)

wireguard-go version

WireGuide uses wireguard-go from May 2025 (57 commits ahead of the version in the official app), which includes deadlock fixes, socket buffer improvements, and handshake performance gains. See the wireguard-go commit log for details.

Install

macOS (Homebrew)

brew tap korjwl1/tap
brew install --cask wireguide

macOS (Manual)

Download from Releases, unzip, move to /Applications.

If macOS shows "app is damaged", run: xattr -cr /Applications/WireGuide.app

Build from Source

# Prerequisites
brew install go node
go install github.com/go-task/task/v3/cmd/task@latest
go install github.com/wailsapp/wails/v3/cmd/wails3@latest

# Build
task build

# Run
./bin/wireguide

Screenshots

VPN Connected — real-time stats & speed graph	Config Editor — WireGuard syntax highlighting
Editor Autocomplete — field suggestions	Network Diagnostics
Settings — theme, language, log level	Log Viewer — level filtering, auto-scroll
Empty State — drag & drop .conf import	System Tray Menu

Features

Architecture

graph LR
    subgraph GUI["GUI Process (unprivileged)"]
        A1[Wails + Svelte]
        A2[Config editor]
        A3[System tray]
        A4[Diagnostics]
    end

    subgraph Helper["Helper Process (root)"]
        B1[wireguard-go + wgctrl]
        B2[TUN / routing / DNS]
        B3[Kill switch / firewall]
        B4[Reconnect monitor]
        B5[Route monitor]
    end

    GUI <-->|"JSON-RPC over UDS"| Helper

• Single binary — wireguide runs as GUI or helper (--helper flag)
• Privilege separation — GUI is unprivileged; helper runs as root
• IPC — JSON-RPC over Unix socket (macOS/Linux) or named pipe (Windows)
• Helper lifecycle — Stays alive while tunnel is active (wg-quick semantics)

Tech Stack

Sponsor

If WireGuide is useful to you, consider sponsoring to support development.

License

MIT