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Jellyfin

Jellyfin is a media server for your own movies, TV shows, music and photos. It organizes the library with metadata and streams to web browsers, phones, TVs and other clients, transcoding when needed. It has no premium tier and needs no external account. Jellyfin is a volunteer project that started as a fork of Emby.

Code Fireworks render of the Jellyfin repository, as of Nov 2026
As of Nov 2026Code Fireworks ↗

Why it fits

The server is licensed under GPL version 2. Server and clients can be installed without a paid product license for private use.

Screenshot of Jellyfin
Screenshot: Screenshot from jellyfin-ux, CC BY-SA 4.0 · terms · source

Getting started

5 steps · clarity 3/5

Prerequisites (from the official docs):

  • A server or PC with Docker (native packages for Linux, Windows and macOS are also available)
  • Your media files on a disk the server can read
  • Port 8096 for the web interface (UDP ports are used for optional client discovery)

Steps:

  1. Create folders for config and cache on the server.
  2. Start the official jellyfin/jellyfin image with volumes for config, cache and your media, as shown in the container guide.
  3. Open http://<server>:8096 to start the setup wizard.
  4. Create your admin user in the wizard.
  5. Add your media libraries and install Jellyfin clients on your devices.

Official container guide: https://jellyfin.org/docs/general/installation/container/

All installation methods: https://jellyfin.org/docs/general/installation/

Notes

Some client stores may have their own distribution terms; core server remains GPL-2.0.

Sources

  1. jellyfin.org
  2. github.com/jellyfin/jellyfin/blob/master/LICENSE
  3. jellyfin.org/docs/general/installation
  4. github.com/jellyfin/jellyfin/blob/master/README.md
  5. jellyfin.org/docs/general/installation/container

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