A self-hosted multimedia stack lets you manage, stream, and share your personal media library: photos, music, videos, podcasts, without relying on YouTube, Spotify, iCloud, or Google Photos. Everything stays on your hardware, under your control.
Choose Your Stack
| Use Case | Best Tool(s) | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Full family media hub (movies, TV, music, photos, remote streaming) | Jellyfin (free) | Jellyfin is entirely free, open-source, and privacy-focused with free hardware acceleration, but requires more manual setup and technical skill. |
| Full family media hub (movies, TV, music, photos, remote streaming) | Plex Free / Pass (paid) | Plex offers a polished experience and easy remote streaming, but charges for features like hardware transcoding. |
| Personal photo archive (privacy-first, AI tagging) | Photoprism | Photoprism: facial recognition, map view. |
| Personal photo archive (privacy-first, photo management) | Immich | Immich: faster, better for large libraries, offline-first. |
| Music-only streaming (low resource, Subsonic-compatible) | Navidrome | Lightweight, works with DSub, Symfonium, etc. Runs on Raspberry Pi. |
| Podcasts + RSS | Podgrab + AntennaPod (client) | Fully offline, no tracking, self-hosted downloader, auto-downloads episodes. |
💡 Don’t overbuild. Most homelabbers start with Jellyfin + direct play on modest hardware. Add Photoprism or Navidrome later as needs grow.
Hardware Guidance
| Scenario | CPU | RAM | Storage | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Personal use (direct play, local network) | Dual-core x86 or ARM (e.g., Raspberry Pi 4) | 2–4 GB | As needed | No transcoding → low power, silent |
| Family streaming (remote access, 1080p/4K) |
Quad-core x86, AVX2 (e.g., Ryzen 5) | 8+ GB | NAS or multi-drive | Enable hardware transcoding (Intel Quick Sync, AMD VCE, or NVIDIA NVENC) |
| Public/internet streaming (multiple users, high concurrency) | 6+ cores, GPU | 16+ GB | RAID array | Use a backup, reverse proxy, and CDN cache if exposing publicly |
💡 Key tip: If you only stream within your home network and your devices support the file format (direct play), you don’t need powerful hardware. Transcoding is the resource hog—not storage or playback.
Why Use It
- Own your memories: No algorithmic feeds, ads, or sudden policy changes deleting your content.
- Unlimited storage: Scale with your own drives, not subscription tiers.
- Custom playback: Stream 4K videos, lossless audio, or raw photo libraries across all your devices.
💡 Best For families, creators, archivists, and media enthusiasts who value ownership over convenience, and want their entertainment free from tracking or paywalls.
Trusted Resources
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