Install Jellyfin Server Inside Docker Container in Linux

Jellyfin Server is a home media server to manage and stream digital media to various devices. It provides a centralized media platform for storing, organizing, and access personal media collection such as movies, TV shows, music, photos, and other media.

This tutorial explains how to install Jellyfin Server inside a Docker container in the Linux. Commands have been tested on Ubuntu.

Prepare environment

Make sure you have installed Docker in your system. If you are using Ubuntu, installation instructions can be found in the post.

Install Jellyfin Server

• Host network

Run the following command to create a container for Jellyfin Server that uses host network:

docker run -d --name=jellyfin --restart=always --network=host \
    -v /opt/jellyfin/config:/config \
    -v /opt/jellyfin/media:/media \
    -v /opt/jellyfin/cache:/cache \
    jellyfin/jellyfin

• User-defined bridge network

User-defined bridge network can be used for listening on different port. By default, Jellyfin service is listening on port 8096. It can be changed with -p option.

docker network create app-net

docker run -d --name=jellyfin --restart=always --network=app-net \
    -p 8080:8096 \
    -v /opt/jellyfin/config:/config \
    -v /opt/jellyfin/media:/media \
    -v /opt/jellyfin/cache:/cache \
    jellyfin/jellyfin

Testing Jellyfin Server

Place media files to /opt/jellyfin/media directory. For testing purpose, the following video file can be downloaded:

sudo wget -qO /opt/jellyfin/media/bunny.mp4 http://commondatastorage.googleapis.com/gtv-videos-bucket/sample/BigBuckBunny.mp4

Open a web browser and go to http://<IP_ADDRESS>:8096, where <IP_ADDRESS> is the IP address of the system. Follow the on-screen instructions to prepare Jellyfin Server. Select display language, create administrator account, and set up media libraries (use /media folder). After that, you will be redirected to a page to log in to the dashboard.

Uninstall Jellyfin Server

To completely remove the Jellyfin Server, remove its container:

docker rm --force jellyfin

Remove Jellyfin Server image:

docker rmi jellyfin/jellyfin

You can also remove Jellyfin Server data:

sudo rm -rf /opt/jellyfin

If a user-defined bridge network was created, you can delete it as follows:

docker network rm app-net