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Lot's of criticism on here, but I love Jellyfin. I came from Plex a few years ago after their login server had an outage and I was unable to access the media t

Lot's of criticism on here, but I love Jellyfin. I came from Plex a few years ago after their login server had an outage and I was unable to access the media that was on my local computer. Before that I'd been annoyed by them pushing TV shows and since then I've heard about them giving reports on what people have watched. All in all I'm happy. My setup is Jellyfin in a docker container running on a debian machine with an i7-1165G7. It's got a mounted NFS link to my Synology NAS with all the files. The main client I used is Android TV running on an NVIDIA shield. All in all, it's been great. I've got a few nitpicks---loading on ios app isn't as fast as I like if I try to jump to the middle of a movie---but all in all it's great for just watching movies, tv shows, videos, &c. All without any link to the outside world. It's lovely. They also are producing new features at a nice clip and have a strong community. I expect it to keep getting better and better, but honestly even if it never changed I'd happily use it for years.

ryanmcbride 2y ago
Every once in a while I knock around the idea of migrating off Plex and onto Jellyfin. For a long time it was that sharing libraries with friends was a pain, but now literally the only thing stopping me is that they don't have a ps5 app, and that's how one of my friends uses my plex server lol. If they get one, it's all over for plex (in my friend group).
- dbetteridge 2y ago
  Ps5 Web browser with a bookmark? But I hear ya, console support tends to lag behind because of the rules and costs of app dev for them
  - ryanmcbride 2y ago
    I mean I could also just tell him it's 2025 and there's 700 ways for him to use plex on his tv, but it's also just kind of funny to me so I keep it going.
- bhaney 2y ago
  Keep in mind that you don't necessarily need to "migrate" all at once. There's nothing wrong with running both Plex and Jellyfin pointed at the same media library, and using whichever one has the better client for a particular platform.
  - loughnane 2y ago
    This is a good point. I did this for probably 6 months before switching over completely.
  - walthamstow 2y ago
    I tried this but using two servers means you lose or fragment all your watch history. If I have to remember where I am in a series myself, I might as well just use VLC.
    - theossuary 2y ago
      There is JellyPlexWatch, which will sync the databases between jellyfin and Plex. I've been using both next to each other for a while with that setup to sync watch history. Honestly I haven't been able to move over to Jellyfin after the drama around the integration of skip intro, but I hope things get better. https://github.com/luigi311/JellyPlex-Watched https://github.com/luigi311/JellyPlex-Watched
      - jillyboel 2y ago
        > the drama around the integration of skip intro what are you referring to?
        defrost 2y ago
        A project to integrate additional "media segments" to identify introductions and end credits for auto-skipping. There was something that worked, going forward the core team decided to focus on a tight stream lined core and decruft 'features'. Discussion: https://old.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/1dbiw90/skip_intro_support_in_jellyfin/ https://old.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/1dbiw90/skip_in... https://forum.jellyfin.org/t-intro-skipper-project-dead https://forum.jellyfin.org/t-intro-skipper-project-dead Seems like a temporary (indefinite) suspension and a storm in a teacup from those attached to the feature.
- crobibero 2y ago
  We contacted Sony asking about creating an app. The TLDR of that conversation is they said "Don't call us, we'll call you". Open source never really mattered, they're not interested.
  - ryanmcbride 2y ago
    Really? I assumed you'd just license an sdk similar to creating a game. They only allow certain apps?
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
kelnos 2y ago
I love Jellyfin too, but there are a bunch of rough edges I run into often, like: Chromecast support is flaky. Most of the time when I cast from my Android phone, the app immediately "forgets" that there's something playing back on the Chromecast (even though it's still connected to it), so I can't control playback at all. It's also hit or miss if the Chromecast will successfully play the media if Jellyfin decides it needs to transcode it. So I got a little NUC-like box (Intel N100), and installed Jellyfin on it (it was previously running on an old 2012 Mac Mini running Linux). I connected it directly to the TV and installed jellyfin-media-player on it, set to auto-login and start X on boot, with a minimal session that just runs JMP only in fullscreen mode. I use JMP on my laptop, or the Android app, to control it. JMP will randomly lose its connection to the Jellyfin server (even though it's running on the same machine), and won't try to reconnect, so nearly every time I go to use it, I have to ssh in and restart JMP so it reconnects. On top of that, I get occasional audio dropouts when watching 4k content, and sometimes see 4k video stuttering (yes, hardware decoding is enabled for playback, and I've verified in the logs that it's being used). At those times, the box is around 40% idle, and intel_gpu_top shows that the decode and render bits have what I think should be more than enough headroom to avoid that sort of thing. I understand JMP uses libmpv for playback, so out of curiosity I tried playing video using mpv directly, and somehow JMP's player uses about 50% more CPU than mpv standalone does, and I don't hear any dropouts or see any stuttering on the same media. I get that a video player that's embedded in an application might have some overhead, but 50% is a bit much. I get that Jellyfin is maintained by volunteers (I also maintain open source in my spare time, so I know how tough it can be to be responsive to user requests), but these issues are quite frustrating. I don't want to use something closed like Plex or Emby (which may or may not be better), so it's still the right trade off for me. And what it can do is truly amazing. I love that I can play things while I'm on the go, VPN'ing to my home network, and Jellyfin will transcode down to a crappy-enough bitrate to fit within the confines of my garbage Comcast upload speed.
- thedanbob 2y ago
  > Chromecast support is flaky. Most of the time when I cast from my Android phone, the app immediately "forgets" that there's something playing back on the Chromecast (even though it's still connected to it), so I can't control playback at all. It's also hit or miss if the Chromecast will successfully play the media if Jellyfin decides it needs to transcode it. This might be more the Chromecast's fault as I've had a similar experience with Plex.
s0rce 2y ago
I came from Kodi and Jellyfin has been great. I just run it on Ubuntu on a mini PC with an external hard drive and its working great. Stream to my TV with an nvidia shield.
foobiekr 2y ago
I love jellyfin but their web model is just bizarre. Why on earth, when you go to 192.168.whatever:8096 does it ask you what server you want to connect to? Like.. THE ONE SERVING THE PAGE. Just now I decided to connect to Jellyfin over tailscale and it's asking me to add a server; on 100.xxx, which is the jellyfin server which served the UI. And it doesn't seem to want to accept any answer as to what the server URL is.
- polymo1 2y ago
  I am pretty sure that's a config option
  - foobiekr 2y ago
    It may be, but it's also the default behavior and .. really... makes no sense at all.
- bhaney 2y ago
  While the most common jellyfin distribution bundles the server and web UI together, the web UI (jellyfin-web) is a separate project from the server (jellyfin) and can be used to connect to multiple backends (which can run on the same or different hosts), which is why that functionality and UI is there. For what its worth, the web client should be autodetecting the server it was bundled with and using it without asking you each time. The only time it didn't do that for me was when my network was misconfigured and some requests were getting swallowed, which confused the client and caused it to fall back to the server-connection UI.
- RiverCrochet 2y ago
  > Why on earth, when you go to 192.168.whatever:8096 does it ask you what server you want to connect to? This lets you connect to and play another friend's Jellyfin rather nicely. I think it's also so the HTML and JS that forms the web interface can basically be the app as well. > And it doesn't seem to want to accept any answer as to what the server URL is. Should be "http://192.168.100.xxx:8096 http://192.168.100.xxx:8096" - make sure your jellyfin isn't just set to listen on localhost only though.
ews 2y ago
I have the exact same setup, with tailscale I can watch my media from anywhere on my phone or web. Highly recommended and I honestly do not understand the criticism.
mmcnl 2y ago
I made the transition the other way around. I tried Emby, then Jellyfin, and finally Plex. Plex is just much better, especially with Plex Pass. The apps are everywhere and they just work (Tizen, iOS, web, etc.). The Jellyfin apps are subpar, poorly translated, buggy, and not available on all platforms (looking at you Tizen). Plex is basically Dropbox in the infamous Dropbox HN comment.
- crtasm 2y ago
  You could note the price difference too.
- atombender 2y ago
  I was a Plex user for the longest time, with PMS on a Linux box and the Plex app on Apple TV and iPhone. However: * It's always been quite slow and flaky. Library not scanning things, media library not connectable, etc. * Often very long delay from starting a show until it actually plays. Often very slow scrubbing/skipping. * The automatic subtitle downloading never works. The manual subtitle downloading never works. * The UI was getting on my nerves trying to offer "recommendations" — I download my own stuff and don't need an app to try to push my own media through some kind of algorithm that's broken — and constantly promoting the Plex streaming service. I got fed up and set up Jellyfin with Infuse as the client. Now shows start immediately with no buffering delay, never have any glitchy library issues, and the subtitle downloading just works. My main issue is that Jellyfin's matching can be quite poor. It often doesn't understand when episodes belong to a show. Also, Infuse's UI is pretty bad and doesn't align at all with how I think media should be accessed.

ryanmcbride 2y ago

Every once in a while I knock around the idea of migrating off Plex and onto Jellyfin. For a long time it was that sharing libraries with friends was a pain, but now literally the only thing stopping me is that they don't have a ps5 app, and that's how one of my friends uses my plex server lol. If they get one, it's all over for plex (in my friend group).

dbetteridge 2y ago
Ps5 Web browser with a bookmark? But I hear ya, console support tends to lag behind because of the rules and costs of app dev for them
- ryanmcbride 2y ago
  I mean I could also just tell him it's 2025 and there's 700 ways for him to use plex on his tv, but it's also just kind of funny to me so I keep it going.
bhaney 2y ago
Keep in mind that you don't necessarily need to "migrate" all at once. There's nothing wrong with running both Plex and Jellyfin pointed at the same media library, and using whichever one has the better client for a particular platform.
- loughnane 2y ago
  This is a good point. I did this for probably 6 months before switching over completely.
- walthamstow 2y ago
  I tried this but using two servers means you lose or fragment all your watch history. If I have to remember where I am in a series myself, I might as well just use VLC.
  - theossuary 2y ago
    There is JellyPlexWatch, which will sync the databases between jellyfin and Plex. I've been using both next to each other for a while with that setup to sync watch history. Honestly I haven't been able to move over to Jellyfin after the drama around the integration of skip intro, but I hope things get better. https://github.com/luigi311/JellyPlex-Watched https://github.com/luigi311/JellyPlex-Watched
    - jillyboel 2y ago
      > the drama around the integration of skip intro what are you referring to?
      - defrost 2y ago
        A project to integrate additional "media segments" to identify introductions and end credits for auto-skipping. There was something that worked, going forward the core team decided to focus on a tight stream lined core and decruft 'features'. Discussion: https://old.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/1dbiw90/skip_intro_support_in_jellyfin/ https://old.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/1dbiw90/skip_in... https://forum.jellyfin.org/t-intro-skipper-project-dead https://forum.jellyfin.org/t-intro-skipper-project-dead Seems like a temporary (indefinite) suspension and a storm in a teacup from those attached to the feature.
crobibero 2y ago
We contacted Sony asking about creating an app. The TLDR of that conversation is they said "Don't call us, we'll call you". Open source never really mattered, they're not interested.
- ryanmcbride 2y ago
  Really? I assumed you'd just license an sdk similar to creating a game. They only allow certain apps?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

kelnos 2y ago

I love Jellyfin too, but there are a bunch of rough edges I run into often, like: Chromecast support is flaky. Most of the time when I cast from my Android phone, the app immediately "forgets" that there's something playing back on the Chromecast (even though it's still connected to it), so I can't control playback at all. It's also hit or miss if the Chromecast will successfully play the media if Jellyfin decides it needs to transcode it. So I got a little NUC-like box (Intel N100), and installed Jellyfin on it (it was previously running on an old 2012 Mac Mini running Linux). I connected it directly to the TV and installed jellyfin-media-player on it, set to auto-login and start X on boot, with a minimal session that just runs JMP only in fullscreen mode. I use JMP on my laptop, or the Android app, to control it. JMP will randomly lose its connection to the Jellyfin server (even though it's running on the same machine), and won't try to reconnect, so nearly every time I go to use it, I have to ssh in and restart JMP so it reconnects. On top of that, I get occasional audio dropouts when watching 4k content, and sometimes see 4k video stuttering (yes, hardware decoding is enabled for playback, and I've verified in the logs that it's being used). At those times, the box is around 40% idle, and intel_gpu_top shows that the decode and render bits have what I think should be more than enough headroom to avoid that sort of thing. I understand JMP uses libmpv for playback, so out of curiosity I tried playing video using mpv directly, and somehow JMP's player uses about 50% more CPU than mpv standalone does, and I don't hear any dropouts or see any stuttering on the same media. I get that a video player that's embedded in an application might have some overhead, but 50% is a bit much. I get that Jellyfin is maintained by volunteers (I also maintain open source in my spare time, so I know how tough it can be to be responsive to user requests), but these issues are quite frustrating. I don't want to use something closed like Plex or Emby (which may or may not be better), so it's still the right trade off for me. And what it can do is truly amazing. I love that I can play things while I'm on the go, VPN'ing to my home network, and Jellyfin will transcode down to a crappy-enough bitrate to fit within the confines of my garbage Comcast upload speed.

thedanbob 2y ago
> Chromecast support is flaky. Most of the time when I cast from my Android phone, the app immediately "forgets" that there's something playing back on the Chromecast (even though it's still connected to it), so I can't control playback at all. It's also hit or miss if the Chromecast will successfully play the media if Jellyfin decides it needs to transcode it. This might be more the Chromecast's fault as I've had a similar experience with Plex.

s0rce 2y ago

I came from Kodi and Jellyfin has been great. I just run it on Ubuntu on a mini PC with an external hard drive and its working great. Stream to my TV with an nvidia shield.

foobiekr 2y ago

I love jellyfin but their web model is just bizarre. Why on earth, when you go to 192.168.whatever:8096 does it ask you what server you want to connect to? Like.. THE ONE SERVING THE PAGE. Just now I decided to connect to Jellyfin over tailscale and it's asking me to add a server; on 100.xxx, which is the jellyfin server which served the UI. And it doesn't seem to want to accept any answer as to what the server URL is.

polymo1 2y ago
I am pretty sure that's a config option
- foobiekr 2y ago
  It may be, but it's also the default behavior and .. really... makes no sense at all.
bhaney 2y ago
While the most common jellyfin distribution bundles the server and web UI together, the web UI (jellyfin-web) is a separate project from the server (jellyfin) and can be used to connect to multiple backends (which can run on the same or different hosts), which is why that functionality and UI is there. For what its worth, the web client should be autodetecting the server it was bundled with and using it without asking you each time. The only time it didn't do that for me was when my network was misconfigured and some requests were getting swallowed, which confused the client and caused it to fall back to the server-connection UI.
RiverCrochet 2y ago
> Why on earth, when you go to 192.168.whatever:8096 does it ask you what server you want to connect to? This lets you connect to and play another friend's Jellyfin rather nicely. I think it's also so the HTML and JS that forms the web interface can basically be the app as well. > And it doesn't seem to want to accept any answer as to what the server URL is. Should be "http://192.168.100.xxx:8096 http://192.168.100.xxx:8096" - make sure your jellyfin isn't just set to listen on localhost only though.

ews 2y ago

I have the exact same setup, with tailscale I can watch my media from anywhere on my phone or web. Highly recommended and I honestly do not understand the criticism.

mmcnl 2y ago

I made the transition the other way around. I tried Emby, then Jellyfin, and finally Plex. Plex is just much better, especially with Plex Pass. The apps are everywhere and they just work (Tizen, iOS, web, etc.). The Jellyfin apps are subpar, poorly translated, buggy, and not available on all platforms (looking at you Tizen). Plex is basically Dropbox in the infamous Dropbox HN comment.

crtasm 2y ago
You could note the price difference too.
atombender 2y ago
I was a Plex user for the longest time, with PMS on a Linux box and the Plex app on Apple TV and iPhone. However: * It's always been quite slow and flaky. Library not scanning things, media library not connectable, etc. * Often very long delay from starting a show until it actually plays. Often very slow scrubbing/skipping. * The automatic subtitle downloading never works. The manual subtitle downloading never works. * The UI was getting on my nerves trying to offer "recommendations" — I download my own stuff and don't need an app to try to push my own media through some kind of algorithm that's broken — and constantly promoting the Plex streaming service. I got fed up and set up Jellyfin with Infuse as the client. Now shows start immediately with no buffering delay, never have any glitchy library issues, and the subtitle downloading just works. My main issue is that Jellyfin's matching can be quite poor. It often doesn't understand when episodes belong to a show. Also, Infuse's UI is pretty bad and doesn't align at all with how I think media should be accessed.