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.onion as origin

Use a Tor hidden service as your origin. Available on every plan. Required on Free.

Status: skeleton

Full content lands in a follow-up pass.

When to use this

  • You're on the Free tier (this is the only origin type Free supports)
  • You want neither the edge nor your origin to know each other's IP
  • Your origin runs in a network where you don't want a public IP visible

Steps

  1. Run a Tor hidden service on your origin host
    • Standard tor config: HiddenServiceDir, HiddenServicePort 80 127.0.0.1:<port>
    • Capture the .onion address from <HiddenServiceDir>/hostname
  2. In the portal: Sites → New site → Origin: .onion → paste address
  3. Save. The edge will fetch through Tor on cache misses.

Caveats

  • Latency on cache fills is higher than clearnet (Tor circuits add ~1-3 round trips)
  • Your origin sees no client IP (we hash circuit ID before forwarding)
  • HLS over Tor is slow (lots of small segment fetches); progressive MP4 with +faststart is recommended for video