dhcpd setup

created onNovember 18, 2025
reached its EOL in the end of 2022 and is now superseded by .

One reason to use any longer is when a migration is to version 1.9.1 or later is not possible.

This is the case when in a network, multiple hardware MACs are configured to get the same IP. I.e. for a client alternating between eth0 and wlan0 and using the same IP for eth0 and wlan0.

should not be confused with , the DHCP client demon.

a sample minimal dhcp.conf

The config file for usually is . Here is a sample config file for a minmal setup without DDNS updates. All values are pretty much self-explaining. A comment starts with the sign, all lines with a directive are terminated with the semicolon .

# dhcpd.conf base.lan authoritative; # ddns-update-style none; # ddns-updates on; # ddns-domainname "base.lan."; # ddns-rev-domainname "in-addr.arpa"; use-host-decl-names on; # allow client-updates; allow unknown-clients; # log-facility local0; # net definition subnet 192.168.0.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 { authoritative; default-lease-time 7200; max-lease-time 14400; range 192.168.0.21 192.168.0.254; option subnet-mask 255.255.255.0; option domain-name "base.lan"; option routers 192.168.0.1; option domain-name-servers 192.168.0.1, 9.9.9.9, 193.110.81.0; option broadcast-address 192.168.0.255; host idoru-eth0 { # eth0 hardware ethernet 80:FA:5B:64:D3:B6; fixed-address 192.168.0.10; option host-name "idoru"; } host idoru-wlan0 { # wlan0 hardware ethernet 18:1D:EA:9E:CA:DC; fixed-address 192.168.0.10; option host-name "idoru"; } }

testing the dhcpd.conf

The can be tested with .

default file locations

config file /etc/dhcpd.conf
database file for leases /var/db/dhcpd.leases
PID file /var/run/dhcpd.pid

On my current OpenWRT installation, the database file for leases is in

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