How I Host a Production Blog & WhatsApp Bot on a Raspberry Pi Using Cloudflare Tunnel and Nginx

Running production workloads on a Raspberry Pi sounds like a side-project—until you realize it solves problems that cloud servers can’t.

In this post, I’ll break down why I host my blog and WhatsApp bot on a Raspberry Pi, how Cloudflare Tunnel makes it internet-accessible despite a dynamic residential IP, and why Nginx is the glue that lets me scale multiple services cleanly.

This setup is:

• Cheap

• Stable

• Surprisingly production-ready

• And in some cases better than EC2

Why Raspberry Pi Instead of EC2 or a VPS?

Most people start blogs on:

• Shared hosting

• VPS

• Cloud platforms like EC2

That works—until you deal with automation, bots, or long-running services.

The WhatsApp Automation Problem

If you run WhatsApp automation on cloud servers:

• WhatsApp detects data-center IP ranges

• Automation traffic is flagged

• Accounts get blocked

• This often violates WhatsApp’s ToS

A Raspberry Pi running from home uses a residential IP, which:

• Looks like normal user traffic

• Avoids cloud ASN detection

• Dramatically reduces ban risk

That alone justified moving critical services off the cloud.

Real-World Use Case: WhatsApp Bot on Raspberry Pi

I run a WhatsApp bot using a Go-based library:

• https://github.com/aldinokemal/go-whatsapp-web-multidevice

This bot runs 24/7 on a Raspberry Pi and has been far more stable than cloud-hosted attempts.

But that introduced a new challenge…

The Core Challenge: Exposing a Raspberry Pi to the Internet

Residential internet has problems:

• Dynamic IP (changes anytime)

• NAT & firewall restrictions

• No inbound ports by default

You cannot reliably point a domain to your home IP.

This is exactly what Cloudflare Tunnel solves.

Cloudflare Tunnel: The Backbone of This Setup

Cloudflare Tunnel creates an outbound connection from your Raspberry Pi to Cloudflare.

What This Gives You

• No port forwarding

• No static IP

• No router changes

• No exposed home network

• Secure, encrypted traffic

Your Raspberry Pi calls Cloudflare—not the other way around.

📘 Official docs:
https://developers.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-one/networks/connectors/cloudflare-tunnel/

📘 Guide I followed:
https://pimylifeup.com/raspberry-pi-cloudflare-tunnel/

⚠️ Important Caveat (Learned the Hard Way)

Do not create the tunnel from the Cloudflare dashboard UI.

If you:

• Create the tunnel in UI

• Then try configuring it on Raspberry Pi

You’ll hit:

• Token mismatches

• Broken configs

• Silent failures

✅ Correct Approach

Always:

• Install cloudflared on the Raspberry Pi

• Create the tunnel from the terminal

• Let the Pi manage credentials locally

This single decision saves hours.

Why Nginx Is Mandatory (Not Optional)

Once your tunnel works, exposing one service is easy.

But what about:

• Blog

• API

• Bot webhook

• Admin panel

• Side projects?

That’s where Nginx comes in.

Using Nginx to Host Multiple Services Behind One Tunnel

Nginx acts as a reverse proxy:

• One Cloudflare Tunnel

• One domain

• Multiple internal services

• Clean routing by path

• Optional authentication per route

Nginx Configuration (Production Example)

server {
    listen 80 default_server;
    server_name example.yourdomain.com;

    # Protected API
    location /api {
        auth_basic "Restricted API Access";
        auth_basic_user_file /etc/nginx/.htpasswd;

        rewrite ^/api/?(.*) /$1 break;
        proxy_pass http://localhost:8000;

        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Prefix /api;
    }

    # Secondary Service
    location /service {
        proxy_pass http://localhost:5001;
    }

    # Blog / Main App
    location / {
        proxy_pass http://localhost:5000;
    }
}

What This Enables

RouteServicePort/Blog5000/apiAuth-protected API8000/serviceSecondary service5001

All behind one tunnel.

Why This Is Perfect for a Blog

Hosting a blog this way gives you:

• ✅ Zero hosting cost

• ✅ Full ownership

• ✅ Residential IP trust

• ✅ Easy expansion

• ✅ No cloud vendor lock-in

And tomorrow, if you want to add:

• Webhooks

• Bots

• AI workers

• Internal dashboards

You don’t need another server.

Final Thoughts

This setup isn’t anti-cloud.
It’s right-tool-for-the-job engineering.

For:

• Blogs

• Automation

• Bots

• Side projects

• Always-on services

Raspberry Pi + Cloudflare Tunnel + Nginx is:

Minimal, powerful, and production-worthy.