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tunnelbyte signup [flags]
Trades up your anonymous tier for an account-linked free tier: higher caps, multi-machine use, and a friendlier rate limit.
TierBytes (rolling 7 days)Session time (rolling 24 h)
Anonymous1 GiB30 min
Free account5 GiB2 h
No per-session wall-clock cap on either tier - the window counters do the work.

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Example

$ tunnelbyte signup
Email: alice@example.com
✓ Magic link sent. Check your inbox to confirm.
$ # ...alice opens the link, clicks "Confirm and upgrade"...
$ tunnelbyte ash
✓ you're on the free tier now - 5 GiB/week, 2 h/day session time
✓ tunnel up via 51.34.65.83 (ash) - free tier

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Flags

FlagDefaultPurpose
--email(prompt)Skip the prompt - useful in scripts.

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What happens

  1. CLI prompts for your email (or accepts --email).
  2. POSTs /v1/accounts/signup with the address.
  3. The server sends a magic link to your inbox.
  4. You open the link. The verify page shows a “Confirm and upgrade” button - one extra click before the token is consumed. (This protects you against Slack / iMessage / Outlook Safe Links previews silently burning the one-shot token before you click.)
  5. The POST behind the button consumes the link and binds your email to the device-bound install token you already had as an anonymous user.
  6. Next tunnelbyte invocation uses the upgraded token automatically.

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Why no password

Email is identity. The magic link is the auth factor. Each device gets its own token derived from your install fingerprint - links don’t replay across devices, and there’s no password to leak or rotate. If you want this account on a second machine, install tunnelbyte there and run tunnelbyte login.

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Notes

  • We don’t verify phone numbers, ask for KYC documents, or run identity checks. The whole flow is sub-30 seconds.
  • Disposable email domains get rejected at signup. Use a real address.
  • One account per email. Re-running signup with the same address sends a fresh magic link to the same account; it doesn’t create a duplicate.

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See also