ZeroTier makes your devices act as if they shared one Ethernet network, with broadcast and bridging. Paperboat connects your machines privately too and is built around working on them: terminals, SSH, files, secrets, previews and tunnels.
Checked against ZeroTier's own documentation and pricing, November 2026. Sources are listed under the table.
ZeroTier emulates Ethernet, so broadcast, multicast and bridging work as on a local network; everything else is up to your own tools.
Paperboat is one install per machine and a sign-in. There is no network, gateway or proxy to plan, and nothing to keep running besides the machines themselves.
ZeroTier has no terminal of its own; you use SSH over the network.
Paperboat terminals run on the machine and keep running when your laptop sleeps or the network drops. When you come back, from the same computer, another one or a browser, you see what happened while you were away, and you can let someone watch or type along.
$ pb devboxZeroTier networks are private; it doesn't publish a port to the internet.
pb preview gives a port a public HTTPS link in one command, and pb tunnel keeps a permanent address with your own domain, on every plan.
$ pb preview 3000ZeroTier runs on routers, NAS boxes and other devices, and can bridge a whole physical network.
Paperboat runs on Linux, macOS and Windows computers and connects those machines only.
Every answer in the ZeroTier column carries a number that links to the page of theirs that says it. Put a second tool beside it
A shell on your machine that you can leave and come back to.
Run one command on another machine and get its output and exit code.
Use ssh and the tools built on it, without managing keys or opening ports.
Send a file to a machine without setting anything up.
The secrets your programs need, delivered to the machine that runs them.
The same settings on every machine, from a repository you control.
A public link to a port on your machine, for as long as you need it.
A public address for a service that stays the same.
Your machines reach each other's ports without exposing them.
Who could read your traffic on the way.
Working with other people, and deciding who may do what.
Which parts you can run on your own servers.
Where it runs.
How you pay, and what is free.
What each product does, from its own documentation, as of November 2026. “No” means its documentation describes no such feature. Found something out of date? The other product's page wins; tell us and we fix ours.
www.zerotier.com/pricing/, November 2026
No. Your machines reach each other's ports privately by name; there is no broadcast or bridging.
Install Paperboat here, then on a second machine. Free for personal use, no card needed.
$ curl -fsSL https://get.pprbt.dev/install | bash > irm https://get.pprbt.dev/install.ps1 | iex