How to setup VPN server (PPTP on CentOS, RedHat and Ubuntu)?

This howto describes the steps in how to setup a PPTP VPN on Centos, Fedora, Debian, and Ubuntu with basic RSA authentication. 

Before the installation make sure to have your Yum repos updated with the Epel repos.

CentOS and Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.x

 wget http://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/5/x86_64/epel-release-5-4.noarch.rpm && sudo rpm -Uvh epel-release-5*.rpm 

CentOS and Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.x

 wget http://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/6/x86_64/epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm && sudo rpm -Uvh epel-release-6*.rpm

CentOS and Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.x

 wget http://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/7/x86_64/e/epel-release-7-5.noarch.rpm && sudo rpm -Uvh epel-release-7*.rpm 

Step 1. Install PPTPD

CentOS/RedHat 6:

 yum install pptpd.x86_64 -y

Ubuntu/Debian:

 apt-get install pptpd

Step 2. Edit IP setttings in /etc/pptpd.conf

echo > /etc/pptpd.conf

paste the following content into the pptpd.conf file 

 #start of custom file #logwtmp option /etc/ppp/options.pptpd localip 192.168.0.1   # local vpn IP  remoteip 192.168.0.100-200  # ip range for connections listen 23.216.x.x # eth0 my example public IP and network interface #end of custom file 

Step 3. Add user account in/etc/ppp/chap-secrets (assign username and password)

vi /etc/ppp/chap-secrets

 usernameForuser1 *  setpassword1here  *
usernameForuser2 *  setpassword2here  *

Step 4. Optional settings in /etc/ppp/options.pptpd

 echo > /etc/ppp/options.pptpd

Paste the following to your options.pptp

 #custom settings for a simple fast pptp server ms-dns 8.8.8.8 ms-dns 4.2.2.2 lock name pptpd require-mschap-v2 # Require MPPE 128-bit encryption # (note that MPPE requires the use of MSCHAP-V2 during authentication)  require-mppe-128 

Step 5. Enable network forwarding in /etc/sysctl.conf

vi /etc/sysctl.conf

 net.ipv4.ip_forward = 1

use the following command to apply the change:

sysctl -p

Step 6. Configure firewall

 iptables -A INPUT -i eth0 -p tcp --dport 1723 -j ACCEPT
iptables -A INPUT -i eth0 -p gre -j ACCEPT
iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -o eth0 -j MASQUERADE
iptables -A FORWARD -i ppp+ -o eth0 -j ACCEPT
iptables -A FORWARD -i eth0 -o ppp+ -j ACCEPT
service iptables save
service iptables restart

Step6-Ubuntu/Debian: Firewall 

apt-get install iptables-persistent
iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -o eth0 -j MASQUERADE && /etc/init.d/iptables-persistent save
iptables -A INPUT -i eth0 -p tcp –dport 1723 -j ACCEPT && iptables -A INPUT -i eth0 -p gre -j ACCEPT && iptables -A INPUT -m state –state ESTABLISHED,RELATED -j ACCEPT

Step 7. Start PPTP VPN server

Centos/Fedora:

 /etc/init.d/pptpd restart-kill && /etc/init.d/pptpd start

Fedora/Debian:

 service pptpd restart

Note: To avoid starting pptp on every reboot you can automated by running chkconfig pptp on

Now you can test the VPN server from any client: Windows PCs, Linux PCs, Android phones/tablets, or iPhone and iPad.

The log of the VPN server, by default, is combined with system log located at /var/log/messages.