Updated July 2026 · 6 min read
Fake-IP or Redir-Host, which one
enhanced-mode only has two values, but the one you pick decides whether your NAS, games and other LAN devices keep working.
How the two differ
fake-ip answers a lookup immediately with a made-up address from 198.18.0.0/16 and never resolves the name for real. It is fast, and it sidesteps poisoning because it never asks an upstream at all.
redir-host resolves properly, gets the real address and then applies your rules. Compatibility is the best you can get, at the cost of some latency and exposure to a poisoned answer.
Where fake-ip bites
Anything that validates an address after receiving it can break: NAS boxes and printers on your LAN, games and voice chat that need peer-to-peer hole punching, and the connectivity check Windows uses to decide whether you are online.
The symptom is usually a spinner rather than an error, because the app is talking to a 198.18 address that does not physically exist.
TUN normally runs with fake-ip. If LAN devices stop responding after you enable TUN, check fake-ip-filter before you switch TUN off.
Writing fake-ip-filter
Domains in this list skip fake-ip and get resolved normally. The usual entries are local suffixes, hostnames of devices on your network, STUN servers used for hole punching, and the domains used by OS connectivity checks.
A leading plus sign matches subdomains as well. Reload the profile after editing the list, and it is worth flushing cached lookups in the browser and the OS too.
When to go back to redir-host
If you only use the system proxy, never touch TUN, and have a lot of devices on the local network, redir-host causes fewer surprises.
Before switching, confirm your DNS goes to an encrypted upstream. Otherwise you invite back exactly the poisoning that fake-ip was quietly protecting you from.
What is the project?
Clash Verge Rev is a Tauri-based GUI for Mihomo with profile management, system proxy, TUN mode, rule editing and WebDAV backups.