Self-Hosting on a Mini PC with Docker + Cloudflare Tunnel

Cloud bills add up surprisingly fast for small projects. I run several services, including this blog, on a single mini PC at home. Here's how.

Why a mini PC

• Always on, and electricity costs just a few dollars a month
• With Docker, the deployment environment is identical to the cloud
• If traffic grows, you can migrate then

There's exactly one problem: "how do I safely expose my home network to the outside?"

Don't open ports

The traditional route is router port forwarding + DDNS + certificate renewals. It's tedious, and it effectively opens your home network to the internet - risky.

Instead, use Cloudflare Tunnel. On the mini PC, cloudflared opens an outbound connection to Cloudflare, and traffic comes in through that tunnel. The number of inbound ports open to the outside: zero.

사용자 → Cloudflare(HTTPS) → 터널 → 미니 PC 의 컨테이너

• No public IP or port forwarding needed
• Cloudflare handles HTTPS certificates automatically
• A dynamic IP doesn't matter

Bundling services with Docker Compose

Each service runs as a container. For a Next.js app, build with output: "standalone" to keep the image light.

services:
  blog:
    build:
      context: .
      dockerfile: apps/blog/Dockerfile
    container_name: why-next-blog
    restart: unless-stopped
    networks: [api]

networks:
  api:
    external: true   # cloudflared 와 같은 네트워크

The key is putting it on the same Docker network as cloudflared. That's how the tunnel reaches the service by its container name.

Attaching a domain

In the Cloudflare dashboard (or the tunnel config), add one Public Hostname.

blog.example.com  →  http://why-next-blog:3001

That's it. Run docker compose up -d --build, and a few minutes later the site is live on your domain.

Wrapping up

• Mini PC + Docker = cheap, with deployments identical to the cloud
• Cloudflare Tunnel gives you HTTPS and a domain with zero open ports
• Place containers on the same network as cloudflared
• Map domain → container:port via Public Hostname

For small services, this combo alone holds up for a long time. It's how I keep several apps running while growing the things I've built.