Pi-hole not loading some websites

Help
1

I’ve been using a Pi-hole for a while, but recently some websites have stopped loading. I’ve rebuilt the Pi-hole on a different machine with a different sd card (script install on a pi 3b with raspberry pi os). So now running a fresh install with just the single base block list.

I’m thinking it might be how the Pi-hole is used. I’ve got a tp-link modem, with primary dns set to the Pi-hole’s static up address. Devices are also manually pointing to local ip on that network. Upstream dns is ip4 to open dns

Expected Behaviour:

Websites load.

Actual Behaviour:

Some websites load (arstechnica.com as an example). Others do not (DuckDuckGo.com)

Debug Token:

curl timed out trying to upload the token.

2

In the Pi-hole's terminal window try the following commands and see what you get back.

See if you can reach an external IP (should show time= and some timings at the end of each line)

ping -c 5 1.1.1.1

See if you can resolve an external domain name (should give an IP address)

dig +short pi-hole.net

Show some IP info

ip addr
ip route

List contents of your /etc/resolv.conf file

cat /etc/resolv.conf

Show your DHCP servers

sudo pihole-FTL dhcp-discover
3

Thanks for the help: greatly appreciated! On my local network I've reserved 192.168.1.2 as the static ip for the pi-hole.

$ ping -c 5 1.1.1.1
PING 1.1.1.1 (1.1.1.1) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 1.1.1.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=56 time=37.0 ms
64 bytes from 1.1.1.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=56 time=26.2 ms
64 bytes from 1.1.1.1: icmp_seq=3 ttl=56 time=25.3 ms
64 bytes from 1.1.1.1: icmp_seq=4 ttl=56 time=25.9 ms
64 bytes from 1.1.1.1: icmp_seq=5 ttl=56 time=52.2 ms

--- 1.1.1.1 ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 5 received, 0% packet loss, time 4006ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 25.301/33.323/52.163/10.375 ms


$ dig +short pi-hole.net
3.18.136.52


$ ip addr
1: lo: <LOOPBACK,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 65536 qdisc noqueue state UNKNOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/loopback 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd 00:00:00:00:00:00
    inet 127.0.0.1/8 scope host lo
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 ::1/128 scope host 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
2: eth0: <NO-CARRIER,BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP> mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state DOWN group default qlen 1000
3: wlan0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state UP group default qlen 1000
    inet 192.168.1.2/24 brd 192.168.1.255 scope global noprefixroute wlan0
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 2405:<redacted>19/64 scope global mngtmpaddr noprefixroute 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::<redacted>18/64 scope link 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever


$ ip route
default via 192.168.1.1 dev wlan0 proto dhcp src 192.168.1.2 metric 303 
192.168.1.0/24 dev wlan0 proto dhcp scope link src 192.168.1.2 metric 303 


$ more /etc/resolv.conf
# Generated by resolvconf
nameserver 192.168.1.2
nameserver fe80::<redacted>05%wlan0


$ sudo pihole-FTL dhcp-discover
Scanning all your interfaces for DHCP servers
Timeout: 10 seconds

* Received 548 bytes from wlan0:192.168.1.1
  Offered IP address: 192.168.1.2
  Server IP address: N/A
  Relay-agent IP address: N/A
  BOOTP server: (empty)
  BOOTP file: (empty)
  DHCP options:
   Message type: DHCPOFFER (2)
   server-identifier: 192.168.1.1
   lease-time: Infinite
   netmask: 255.255.255.0
   router: 192.168.1.1
   dns-server: 192.168.1.2
   dns-server: 0.0.0.0
   --- end of options ---

DHCP packets received on interface wlan0: 1
4

I’ve added some more blocklists to check that was working. I’ve also changed the modem so it is not using the Pi-hole as the dns server, which means I could upload the debug file.

dpnwxyPK

5

I note that your Pi-hole is configured for your Pi-hole host machine's eth0 interface, but that is connected via wlan0 instead:

*** [ DIAGNOSING ]: Network interfaces and addresses
   2: eth0: <NO-CARRIER,BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP> mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state DOWN group default qlen 1000
   3: wlan0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc pfifo_fast state UP group default qlen 1000
       inet 192.168.1.2/24 brd 192.168.1.255 scope global noprefixroute wlan0
          valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
       inet6 240<redacted>d4/64 scope global mngtmpaddr noprefixroute 
          valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
       inet6 fe80::<redacted>18/64 scope link 
          valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever

That should not be an issue with your current Pi-hole Interface Settings (Allow only local requests), but still, you may want to run pihole -r with Reconfigure to adjust for wlan0 accordingly.

Your debug log also shows that you have defined some clients, all of them assigned to the default group, and you have only exactly one group, the default group.
This is a valid configuration, but you should note that Pi-hole would treat any client to the default group anyway, i.e. there would be no need to add clients if you intend to use the default group only.

As for your issue:
Pi-hole is not loading any websites - your client's browser does that.

Pi-hole can only be involved if it would not provide an IP address for a domain that a browser requests resolution of.
That could happen if your Pi-hole would block that domain, or if one of Pi-hole's upstreams would have issues resolving it (e.g. because it would be inaccessible, unresponsive or blocking domains itself).

If it is Pi-hole blocking some sites, How do I determine what domain an ad is coming from? may help you to find out which domains are involved.

6

Apologies I misspoke when saying the Pi-hole wasn’t loading. I understand the distinction. Thanks for the recommendations on working out where the ads are coming from.

I did as suggested and reconfigured to wlan0. I thought I had done that on setup, but apparently not. Regardless it appears to have fixed the issues (DuckDuckGo at least). Thank you!

7

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