WireGuard has not been merged into the Linux kernel mainline

Many excellent new features will be implemented during the Linux Kernel 4.20 development cycle, including improved hardware support and other changes. However, according to Phoronix, the long-awaited WireGuard project, the kernel implementation of the secure VPN tunnel, has not been found in the kernel mainline.

WireGuard is a VPN core implementation with a small number of lines of code, prioritized performance, and simple configuration, trying to provide high performance while simplifying configuration. WireGuard is based on UDP. After the packet is encrypted at one end, it is encapsulated in a UDP packet and sent to the remote endpoint, and then decrypted. Earlier, it was reported that the WireGuard author had submitted WireGuard for review and was ready to merge into the mainline. WireGuard’s author is Jason Donenfeld, who said in an email that WireGuard has been used by many large companies and integrated into tools, distributions, mobile handsets, and data centers, and it’s time to merge it into the core of the kernel.

Also using WireGuard is the new Zinc encryption API for the Linux kernel, which has not been incorporated into the kernel mainline.

Regrettably, even Linus Torvalds himself expressed earlier this year that he hopes to incorporate WireGuard into the kernel as soon as possible. WireGuard has also been praised by many upstream developers and even recommended by US senators. However, it seems that the next version of the kernel does not have WireGuard.

Although WireGuard has not yet entered the core of the kernel, many other distributions can still use WireGuard without the support of the mainline kernel — at least for packages other than the kernel code tree for WireGuard (DKMS).

Of course, we hope that WireGuard will be merged into the core mainline in the next development cycle, and by then it will be a better Linux VPN solution.