5 ms·

I cannot fathom why you'd pay $750 for Plex when Jellyfin is free.

washadjeffmad 4mo ago
Plex has become a platform, and I imagine a certain number of their customers are revenue generating providers. Emby still offers lifetime for $119 with a 30 device limit, but I'm not sure what it offers over Jellyfin. Are there any advantages to Plex outside of being able to easily share and manage library access to many users? It's been a decade since I've used it.
- zetsurin 4mo ago
  Excellent automatic metadata determination. Dead easy to run/setup
vitally3643 4mo ago
I've never understood why anyone would tolerate paying any price to stream media they "own" from a server they own on a network they own to a device they own. At this point a Plex subscription is on par with a Netflix subscription in price, but you have to bring your own media. The only value Plex provides beyond the software is a STUN proxy to connect remote devices to your server behind a residential NAT. But Jellyfin is free and in a lot of cases it's trivial to get your server exposed to the internet. There's countless ways to do it that don't involve paying anyone anything, and more ways that cost far, far less than $750. Perpetually gobsmacked that people are willing to pay a subscription to access their own media on their own hardware. Why not just use Netflix at that point?
- dmonitor 4mo ago
  I imagine a lot of their users (like myself) use Plex because it was the best option 10 years ago and premium was $40 during sales
- 404mm 4mo ago
  Convenience. Jellyfin is becoming better and better but still lacks proper support for certain (Apple) devices, while Plex mostly just works. That being said, Plex apps also lack proper support for HW decoding of some 4K codecs and their AppleTV situation is just plain sad (2 years without an update, no proper HW decoding). With the Pass being $750, I’m expecting Jellyfin to become a more popular alternative than ever. I’d personally never spend this kind of money on Plex.
  - mock-possum 4mo ago
    > certain (Apple) devices, Guessing you’re not talking about iPhones - fwiw Finamp works pretty well.
    - 404mm 4mo ago
      AppleTV to be more specific
  - Kirby64 4mo ago
    > That being said, Plex apps also lack proper support for HW decoding of some 4K codecs and their AppleTV situation is just plain sad (2 years without an update, no proper HW decoding). What does hardware decoding get me on an Apple TV? It seems plenty powerful enough to decode anything I’ve ever thrown at it.
    - xvolter 4mo ago
      The official Plex app hasn't been updated to take advantage of all the hardware decoding support available on the Apple TV. I moved to Infuse, a paid third-app, which I use to stream my Plex media content. Jellyfin official apps are sporadic though, so Infuse is popular for Jellyfin users because it is well maintained and allows you to direct stream content without transcoding as often as possible. -- I'm also the developer of Aviato Media Server (https://aviato.media https://aviato.media), which I just released publicly last week and is available only as a beta, and I am an ex-Plex employee.
ezst 4mo ago
I mean, that's probably what it is, a last squeeze while something somewhat remains of their Plex brand image, knowing the war to Jellyfin is over and lost. At that rate, Jellyfin could start a commercial entity, partner up with mullvad or whoever, and offer a STUN/TURN proxy service that they could charge cents/dollars a year and still make bank.
joshstrange 4mo ago
Have you used Jellyfin’s clients? I’ll be the first in line to complain about some issues with the Plex client [0] but it’s been remarkably stable over the decade+ I’ve used it. I did not enjoy the Jellyfin clients (or lack there of for some platforms) the last time I tried them (2-3 years ago). The Plex client, for all its warts, is much more user-friendly IMHO for the friends/family that might use one’s media server. [0] I could go on and on about things like how shitty Plex is for downloading content to your phone/iPad to take on a plane/offline.
- ndr42 4mo ago
  I'm relatively new to Jellyfin but for iOS and tvOS Swiftfin is a joy to use. Edit: It's native and open source: https://github.com/jellyfin/swiftfin https://github.com/jellyfin/swiftfin
- Saris 4mo ago
  I use Wholfin (https://github.com/damontecres/Wholphin https://github.com/damontecres/Wholphin) on my TV and it's really nice, it's meant to be familiar to users of Plex. On my phone I use Findroid (https://github.com/jarnedemeulemeester/findroid https://github.com/jarnedemeulemeester/findroid) Jellyfin works well enough, I switched over entirely a few months ago.
- toraway 4mo ago
  Jellyfish has improved a bunch in the last few years, the front end is a lot more polished. I finally moved on from Plex a year ago after some kind of upsell nag on a basic feature after already paying for a plan. Although realtime detection of changes on the file system is still a little flaky for me (possibly how I’m running it).

Plex has become a platform, and I imagine a certain number of their customers are revenue generating providers. Emby still offers lifetime for $119 with a 30 device limit, but I'm not sure what it offers over Jellyfin. Are there any advantages to Plex outside of being able to easily share and manage library access to many users? It's been a decade since I've used it.

zetsurin 4mo ago
Excellent automatic metadata determination. Dead easy to run/setup

vitally3643 4mo ago

I've never understood why anyone would tolerate paying any price to stream media they "own" from a server they own on a network they own to a device they own. At this point a Plex subscription is on par with a Netflix subscription in price, but you have to bring your own media. The only value Plex provides beyond the software is a STUN proxy to connect remote devices to your server behind a residential NAT. But Jellyfin is free and in a lot of cases it's trivial to get your server exposed to the internet. There's countless ways to do it that don't involve paying anyone anything, and more ways that cost far, far less than $750. Perpetually gobsmacked that people are willing to pay a subscription to access their own media on their own hardware. Why not just use Netflix at that point?

dmonitor 4mo ago
I imagine a lot of their users (like myself) use Plex because it was the best option 10 years ago and premium was $40 during sales
404mm 4mo ago
Convenience. Jellyfin is becoming better and better but still lacks proper support for certain (Apple) devices, while Plex mostly just works. That being said, Plex apps also lack proper support for HW decoding of some 4K codecs and their AppleTV situation is just plain sad (2 years without an update, no proper HW decoding). With the Pass being $750, I’m expecting Jellyfin to become a more popular alternative than ever. I’d personally never spend this kind of money on Plex.
- mock-possum 4mo ago
  > certain (Apple) devices, Guessing you’re not talking about iPhones - fwiw Finamp works pretty well.
  - 404mm 4mo ago
    AppleTV to be more specific
- Kirby64 4mo ago
  > That being said, Plex apps also lack proper support for HW decoding of some 4K codecs and their AppleTV situation is just plain sad (2 years without an update, no proper HW decoding). What does hardware decoding get me on an Apple TV? It seems plenty powerful enough to decode anything I’ve ever thrown at it.
  - xvolter 4mo ago
    The official Plex app hasn't been updated to take advantage of all the hardware decoding support available on the Apple TV. I moved to Infuse, a paid third-app, which I use to stream my Plex media content. Jellyfin official apps are sporadic though, so Infuse is popular for Jellyfin users because it is well maintained and allows you to direct stream content without transcoding as often as possible. -- I'm also the developer of Aviato Media Server (https://aviato.media https://aviato.media), which I just released publicly last week and is available only as a beta, and I am an ex-Plex employee.

ezst 4mo ago

I mean, that's probably what it is, a last squeeze while something somewhat remains of their Plex brand image, knowing the war to Jellyfin is over and lost. At that rate, Jellyfin could start a commercial entity, partner up with mullvad or whoever, and offer a STUN/TURN proxy service that they could charge cents/dollars a year and still make bank.

joshstrange 4mo ago

Have you used Jellyfin’s clients? I’ll be the first in line to complain about some issues with the Plex client [0] but it’s been remarkably stable over the decade+ I’ve used it. I did not enjoy the Jellyfin clients (or lack there of for some platforms) the last time I tried them (2-3 years ago). The Plex client, for all its warts, is much more user-friendly IMHO for the friends/family that might use one’s media server. [0] I could go on and on about things like how shitty Plex is for downloading content to your phone/iPad to take on a plane/offline.

ndr42 4mo ago
I'm relatively new to Jellyfin but for iOS and tvOS Swiftfin is a joy to use. Edit: It's native and open source: https://github.com/jellyfin/swiftfin https://github.com/jellyfin/swiftfin
Saris 4mo ago
I use Wholfin (https://github.com/damontecres/Wholphin https://github.com/damontecres/Wholphin) on my TV and it's really nice, it's meant to be familiar to users of Plex. On my phone I use Findroid (https://github.com/jarnedemeulemeester/findroid https://github.com/jarnedemeulemeester/findroid) Jellyfin works well enough, I switched over entirely a few months ago.
toraway 4mo ago
Jellyfish has improved a bunch in the last few years, the front end is a lot more polished. I finally moved on from Plex a year ago after some kind of upsell nag on a basic feature after already paying for a plan. Although realtime detection of changes on the file system is still a little flaky for me (possibly how I’m running it).