I want to unlock the ability to view content on my mobile device. I can do that with a one-time purchase (payed with google opinion rewards) or with a subscription. I want to unlock the ability for my entire family though, across multiple devices. Do I have to pay the “one-time payment” for every device? If so, the plex subscription might be worth it. Is there any other major benefit to having a plex subscription?
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Normally people are using https://jellyfin.org/ although i have never used it so I’m not sure if it offers the same functionality but it’s worth a try.
Jellyfin has more functionality but is a lot more technical to set up. I didn’t think it was worth the effort since I already have a Plex server running, but I could see going through that if I didn’t.
Been running Plex with a lifetime pass for around a decade. Worth it for me for sure.
I’ve run both, and I found both required about the same level of technical understanding for an in house setup.
I started with Plex as it worked nicer with my remote, then moved to Jellyfin when I picked up an Android TV. It was the hardware transcoding (without having to pay) that sealed the deal for me.
The dealbreaker about plex for me was having to use their auth servers and having to route traffic through them.
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You create logins on your server which is authenticated through them. I don’t think it routes traffic, just sends login tokens.
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This is problematic because if Plex suffers an outage (which has happened before) users are suddenly unable to sign in. Even if your media server is running fine, through no fault of your own your content becomes inaccessible.
Jellyfin does not have this issue because authentication is handled locally.
However, Plex has too many nice features so I’ll be staying with them for the time being. Credits/intro skipping and Plexamp are a godsend, and the UI is in my opinion way better than what Jellyfin has.
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You can specify networks that don’t require authentication at Plex.tv. When our internet is down at home, we can still use Plex.
There is a plugin which will hopefully be incorporated in the future, for intro skipping. Just google jellyfin intro skipper, its on github. Works ok, some series may beed manual intervention which I am not sure how well it works on Plex. But the point is, does exist for Jellyfin too.
I haven't used Plex but Jellyfin is as easy as throwing this in Docker:
--- version: "2.1" services: jellyfin: image: lscr.io/linuxserver/jellyfin:latest container_name: jellyfin environment: - PUID=1000 - PGID=1000 - TZ=Etc/UTC - JELLYFIN_PublishedServerUrl=192.168.0.5 #optional volumes: - /path/to/library:/config - /path/to/tvseries:/data/tvshows - /path/to/movies:/data/movies ports: - 8096:8096 - 8920:8920 #optional - 7359:7359/udp #optional - 1900:1900/udp #optional restart: unless-stopped(from linuxserver.io)
If you like Ansible and docker, check out saltbox. It’s a great project and if they don’t have what you need, it’s in community. They also use authelia sso. I’ve contributed to their community repo.
If you use Linux Mint, its a one click install from the software manager GUI and the config happens in a web browser. I use a VPN to connect and play videos from it on my phone. I like it and have it set up everywhere I can.
The only thing I can think of when people say jellyfin is more technical. Is there you have to set up port forwarding and some kind of DNS for your server for remote access.
Yes and you’ll need to handle security and authentication yourself. Plex is way better in this regard even if it means the very occasional issue when their servers are down.
My main bone to pick with Plex is that I believe that free and open source software should be gratis (free as in beer). You’re right about the authentication though. I have mine set up with a simple user name and password over http. I rely on the VPN to limit access to the network through a forwarded port. I don’t really like the idea of authentication being done on someone else’s machine for privacy reasons, which is why I choose jellyfin that runs on my local machine. I’m not currently sharing it, and if I did I would change some of my security practices.
If you really need public remote access and you can set up jellyfin, it’s not much more difficult to set up authelia or LDAP with a reverse proxy and valid certs. I use tailscale and just leave simple auth with jellyfin since it’s only myself and family accessing. I used to run Plex for the offloading of authentication to them but I’m with ya, FOSS should be free.
It’s really easy to set up if you use Docker.
I want to use Jellyfin, but the clients just aren’t up to par with Plex and last I checked Jellyfin won’t transcode downloaded media.
Jellyfin does hardware transcoding.
Last I checked, if you wanted to download media to a mobile device to watch later, you could only do that at full quality. Has that changed?
Ah I see, I have misunderstood. I checked and you are correct that it is not possible to download anything but the original file.
It’s weakness is client side apps. Most are web apps and not native. It’s getting better but in comparison plex has native apps on almost everything.
I’m a lifetime plex pass user since 2016
I personally dislike the Plex apps, but yeah its native support is unmatched. The official Jellyfin app for Android gets the job done but isn’t native. However, Findroid seems like the future to me on Android and I use the Kodi plugin on my TV (which is amazing).
This. I use game consoles as my base so I can stream and play games from one place.
Jellyfin for xbox is using the controls to move a cursor around
However Swiftfin and Findroid are making slow but steady progress for mobile devices.
Jellyfin is just great and easy to configure
Yeah I used to use Plex, Jellyfin all the way now.
Literally everything that makes plex better is pay walled. Support FOSS.
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Regarding downloading from other people’s libraries, I believe they need to allow you to do so. I have a library that was shared with me, but I can’t download anything from them, although I can save it “offline” via the Plex app. The unfortunate thing is that the offline function doesn’t not work very well at all, it works about 20% of the time for me on iOS and Android.
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I used to have one. Then I asked myself why I was paying someone else to access my own stuff.
you’re not wrong… but you gotta give credit where credit is due. Plex does a good job of having a client on every platform. Telling family and friends “search for plex on your devices app store” is a whole hell of a lot easier than having them jump thru all the hoops that it takes for jellyfin to work.
This is the main reason I will continue to use Plex over jellyfin
- Open in browser.
Done. Doesn’t seem like that many hoops.
OK great. Now to that on your Roku, Apple TV, Nvidia Shield, smart phone, etc. There aren’t clients for every platform and the ones that do exist frankly are just not even close to as polished looking as Plex is.
Fortunately Roku doesn’t exist in my country. Jellyfin has apps for AndroidTV, AppleTV and smartphones. It really only lacks an app for consoles
Not a good option, at least on desktop it doesn’t direct play hevc
Through a subscription fee, no less.
So you built your own software to access your own stuff?
Because Plex provides you with the user interface to access your own content. Atleast that’s how I like to think about it
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Agreed. But jellyfin is a lot less polished and harder to use for the layman
Jellyfin is shit
Jellyfin is a great alternative if you’re okay with webports.
Plex is definitely worth plex pass though. Many features and it works well on any device.
Eh, plex has been super buggy on my FireTV Cube. For some reason it always jumps back like 6 episodes in a show or just picks a random season when we resume playing the next day.
Jellyfin is the way
Jellyfin with Jellyseer and all the *ars
What sealed the deal for me was skip intro. Incredible feature I don’t believe any other option has.
Wait for lifetime memberships to go on sale if you can. There are a few sales a year. Usually on Black Friday.
Jellyfin plug-in to skip intros: https://github.com/ConfusedPolarBear/intro-skipper
Jellyfin has a skip intro plugin that is easy to install and works great from my experience.
Jellyfin also has skip intro
Interesting. Detected the same way, audio scan? Maybe I need to finally try it out.
I bought the lifetime pass when it went on sale a few years ago. I have used the hell out of it and loved plexamp before that feature was available to non Plex pass users. If I had to buy it now, I might just go with an open source alternative like jellyfin.
What worked for me was subscribing for a month, then cancelling. A couple months later, I got an offer for discounted PlexPass, including the lifetime subscription.
I sub for the skip intros alone, turns out it affects everyone who watches on your server which is great.
I don’t really utilise any other aspects of Plex Pass but £4 isn’t much to me and Plex is insanely useful to me.
I feel like it is, but, be on the lookout for a sale and get the lifetime option when there’s a sale.
Do you know if there’s any frequency to the sale? Like, once per year? Once per quarter? Every major holiday? Or you haven’t a clue?
I don’t really pay attention having bought the lifetime pass years ago, but I do see mentions of it being on sale at least a couple times per year. You may wait for black friday in November if you’re interested but don’t mind waiting.
Pretty sure they do the discount on Black Friday. Or used to, anyway.
I’m not sure. I remember I was waiting for it to go on sale when I needed it, and it happened pretty quickly. But I don’t know if it happens at any set intervals.
It goes on sale a couple times a year. If you check Slickdeals, you can find the last few times it was on sale. It is always on sale during Black Friday though.
I bought it when it was a one time payment. It’s been worth it but I don’t think I would do it if it was a monthly fee.
They have monthly, annual and lifetime subscribtions. I’m gonna wait for the sale to buy a lifetime subscription.
I think you might be confused, unless something changed. It’s a one time $5 fee to view content within the app.
You can also acess app.plex.tv in your browser, and view content that way for free.
You’re right. I was talking about plex-pass.
Plex pass includes the ability to use the mobile apps
I used to have a Plex Pass, but I dont think it’s worth it anymore. I have remote access via Tailscale, which I use for a number of other services as well.
Can you access to all the Plex content and the UI from remote using tailscale?
Yes. Tailscale is an implementation of the Wireguard VPN. As far as Plex knows my phone is local, no need for remote.
If you pay the one time fee or the subscription fee, the system unlocks all the paid features for all of the users on your account. Under your account you can have multiple users, each with their own viewing history (and restrictions, iirc). So if your users log into Plex on their devices using your account username and password - abbadon420 and Hunter1 - and then select their user profile, they will all have access to the features.
The one time fee unlocks forever (the lifetime of Plex, of course) and the subscription unlocks the features for the term of the subscription and then you revert back.
Also make sure to set up 2fa on your login
Also setup a pin on your main account so people can’t get into it and cause mayhem (whether intentional or accidental).
No. Just use Jellyfin
Not sure if you wanna weigh this in as a reason to choose one or the other, but with the one-time purchase you can only stream via Plex on mobile. If you want to download the file and then watch it at a later time WITHOUT streaming you need Plex Lifetime (I made this error!)
