Encryption and trust
Remote access vs site-to-site
A VPN joins one device to a network (remote access) or two networks through their gateways (site-to-site).
A remote-access client ("road warrior") runs the VPN itself and gets one address from the server's pool; the tunnel carries that device only. In site-to-site, two gateways hold one tunnel and route whole networks through it, so the devices behind them need nothing. WireGuard shows the difference in each peer's allowed IPs: a /32 from the pool, or a site's whole subnet (cryptokey routing: a packet is accepted only from the peer whose allowed IPs hold its source). IPsec dominates site-to-site, built into routers and firewalls; SSL/TLS VPNs carry the tunnel inside TLS, often on TCP 443, so remote users connect even from networks that let only web traffic out.