emby & no internet

[Xoores 3]

Hi,

I'm building up my NAS with some home streaming support. I tried Plex, but I hate the fact that I need internet for the thing to work - I want to be fully self-sufficient when I need/want to. Media are on my NAS therefore I should not need the internet for daily operation (otherwise I can just use whatever streaming service I have directly). My usecase is 1 AppleTV, 2 notebooks and perhaps one or two desktop PCs or tablet. I believe that apart from AppleTV all of these will probably use web clients. Maybe laptop of my parents from time to time (with VPN directly connected).

I probably want to have premium license (I'd get lifetime so I don't have to watch for it), because I think I will need HW transcoding for this to work?

But there is one thing that is unclear to me: Will my emby work without internet connection? I could not find clear answer to this question, there are a lot of "buts" around this. 

To clarify: I want to be able to do one simple thing. When my internet cuts off (happens unfortunately rather frequently), I want to be able to reliably get my tablet/laptop and watch some movies without any hassle. I am not willing to babysit some application like Plex (having to log in periodically so it has credentials cached or some nonsense like that) - I want my setup to serve me, not the other way around.

Will this work?

Thanks

[Abobader 3464]

Hello Xoores,

** This is an auto reply **

Please wait for someone from staff support or our members to reply to you.

It's recommended to provide more info, as it explain in this thread:

Thank you.

Emby Team

[Neminem 1518]

No.

If you have premier the server and premier app's needs to phone home via internet to verify License.

But without premier and only using the free app's ( Browser, Ruko, smart tv or Apple TV ) it might work for you.

Check this for further guidance 

Emby Premiere Feature Matrix | Emby Documentation

[Xoores 3]

I saw that matrix - it says that the mobile browser is in the "free" tier, that's why I thought it could work in the first place as that would be the thing I would be using

The question of course is, whether it breaks itself if it cannot phone home (meaning that it will not "silently" fall back to the free tier, but it would refuse to work at all).

If the premium will break itself without the internet, it means that I must not buy premium and keep Emby as "free" for it to work - which would be kind of dumb as I'd be willing to pay to support the project...

[brothom 177]

@XooresI hope I'm understanding what direction you want to head into so here goes.

Say you have a server in your local network and install Emby on it. The local connection should ALWAYS work. You can have TVs, Chromecasts or whatever on the same network and they should "always" be able to reach emby.

You can use three methods to access your server:

Locally
You should be able to use the network's local IP-adress to connect to your Emby server.
This could be http://localhost:8096
If you're trying to access it from another device on the network, you can use the server's IP-adress. For example: http://192.168.2.10:8096

Remote (direct)
If you have port forwarding set up in your router, you can also access your server via your home's IP-adress. 
You can (for example) access your server using: http://69.34.102.22:8096 

Remote (Emby Connect)
The third option is how I prefer my users to connect, which is via Emby Connect. Users can create an account with Emby and I can create a user on my server with that same emailaddress. When the user then goes to app.emby.media my server is listed for them there (if configured properly).

 

[Xoores 3]

@brothom I know how to configure/access the local server, HTTPS and all those things I will never use "Emby connect" (e.g. using any cloud access) for my setup nor will I ever open Emby to the internet (for obvious security reasons). The only way is using "local network" (be it LAN or eventually VPN - yes, for VPN the internet has to be working and that is OK). 

The question is basically whether Emby itself (either free or premium) will work reliably, when I lose internet access or if it breaks like Plex does.

[Q-Droid 989]

Not reliably. As posted already the simple answer is no but it really depends. 

Frequent outages can be tolerated but not extended outages. The claim is that the server can work for around a week without making contact with the mother ship. Emby won't break, it falls back to "free" mode. Basically the same as a lapsed/expired subscription and you would lose the paid features in the matrix. The problem is with apps which also need to phone home. A frequently used app should work through short outages but if you launch an app or device that hasn't been used for some time it's not likely to work. Some apps/devices might be slow or not work at all.

The bottom line is how much of a PITA can you live with.

 

[Xoores 3]

@Q-DroidI want to have this setup to make my life easier, not to add more unnecessary layers of PITA to an already somewhat sore Plex experience

It all boils down to the fact that "sometimes working" solution is usually way worse than "low-tech basic solution" (such as SMB/NFS & mplayer/VLC) that works every time. It's just not worth the hassle for me. I get enough problems thrown my way daily to add more unnecessary ones when I just want to relax.

[brothom 177]

1 hour ago, Xoores said:

@brothom I know how to configure/access the local server, HTTPS and all those things I will never use "Emby connect" (e.g. using any cloud access) for my setup nor will I ever open Emby to the internet (for obvious security reasons). The only way is using "local network" (be it LAN or eventually VPN - yes, for VPN the internet has to be working and that is OK). 

The question is basically whether Emby itself (either free or premium) will work reliably, when I lose internet access or if it breaks like Plex does.

That depends on the amount of plugins / features you enable that are Emby exclusive or not.

Personally, I prefer that my Media Server is driven by the local files, not by software-specific settings or whatever so what I do is this:

TV Shows
Single quality
X:\Media\Shows\Stargate SG-1 (1997)\Season 01\Stargate SG-1 (1997) - s01e01 - Children of the Gods (Part 1).mkv
X:\Media\Shows\Stargate SG-1 (1997)\Season 01\Stargate SG-1 (1997) - s01e02 - Children of the Gods (Part 2).mkv
... etc

Multi-quality
X:\Media\Shows\Stargate SG-1 (1997)\Season 01\HD\Stargate SG-1 (1997) - s01e01 - Children of the Gods (Part 1) - HD.mkv
X:\Media\Shows\Stargate SG-1 (1997)\Season 01\UHD\Stargate SG-1 (1997) - s01e02 - Children of the Gods (Part 2) - 4K.mkv

Movies
Single quality
X:\Media\Movies\The Lord Of The Rings The Return Of The King (2003)\The Lord Of The Rings The Return Of The King (2003) - Extended Edition.mkv
X:\Media\Movies\The Lord Of The Rings The Return Of The King (2003)\The Lord Of The Rings The Return Of The King (2003) - Theatrical Edition.mkv

Multi quality
X:\Media\Movies\The Lord Of The Rings The Return Of The King (2003)\The Lord Of The Rings The Return Of The King (2003) - 4K Extended Edition.mkv
X:\Media\Movies\The Lord Of The Rings The Return Of The King (2003)\The Lord Of The Rings The Return Of The King (2003) - 1080p Theatrical Edition.mkv

Books
X:\Media\Books\Foundation\Foundation (1951)\Foundation.epub (adding years to books is not yet supported)

By just adhering to the same naming convention for EVERY show, season, episode, movie, ebook, music, everything I ensure that whichever media server I wrap around my folders, the data is mostly consistent (I say mostly, because not all media server are born equally of course).

In my case it doesn't matter if I use Jellyfin, Plex or Emby because they all use these naming conventions fortunately which is nice. That way I don't have to worry about meta data. Which is also a thing I enable in Emby; the NFO writer. If for whatever reason the server is reset I can restore it by enable NFO readers but currently I only write meta data to the file so I have a backup.

[Neminem 1518]

@brothomwhat are you talking about ?

Its not about identifying media, but Emby without internet.

[brothom 177]

5 minutes ago, Neminem said:

@brothomwhat are you talking about ?

Its not about identifying media, but Emby without internet.

OP said:

58 minutes ago, Xoores said:

@Q-DroidI want to have this setup to make my life easier, not to add more unnecessary layers of PITA to an already somewhat sore Plex experience

It all boils down to the fact that "sometimes working" solution is usually way worse than "low-tech basic solution" (such as SMB/NFS & mplayer/VLC) that works every time. It's just not worth the hassle for me. I get enough problems thrown my way daily to add more unnecessary ones when I just want to relax.

The best way to get Emby to work (and keep it working) is by conforming to standards without any deviations. No custom middleware, no wacky plugins, just pure file-driven functionality.

Maintaining a strict policy when it comes to file management, it doesn't matter which media server you use because it all boils down to files in places that "make sense".

So it comes down to having a "logical file structure" as a basis. Whatever media server you slap onto your folders doesn't matter because basically all of these conform to the same conventions.

Edited August 12, 2025 by brothom

[Xoores 3]

@brothomI know these things, but that is not what I'm talking about here. It is not how to keep Plex/Jellyfin/Emby working by adhereing to some naming scheme etc. I had Jellyfin, I had Plex. Long time ago I had Kodi, too. All of them had some issues that drove me nuts and I always ended up with mounting NAS share with SMB/NFS and using videplayer. But I'm hoping that in 2025 there is something better than that

This topic is purely about Emby and its licensing and "calling home" and if Emby breaks things if it cannot call home (for my particular use case - LAN web clients).

[brothom 177]

Just now, Xoores said:

@brothomI know these things, but that is not what I'm talking about here. It is not how to keep Plex/Jellyfin/Emby working by adhereing to some naming scheme etc. I had Jellyfin, I had Plex. Long time ago I had Kodi, too. All of them had some issues that drove me nuts and I always ended up with mounting NAS share with SMB/NFS and using videplayer. But I'm hoping that in 2025 there is something better than that

This topic is purely about Emby and its licensing and "calling home" and if Emby breaks things if it cannot call home (for my particular use case - LAN web clients).

As I said before in my first comment; there's nothing from keeping you from using Emby in a local network only.

You don't have to update, you can just keep your server it in a LAN-only setup somewhere, hidden from the rest of the internet and it will still function. You'll have to authenticate directly using local user/password but there's nothing stopping you from doing that.

The reason I brought up the hierarchy is that people tend to install a plugin for this, a plugin for that and slowly "ruin" their installation by creating dependencies outside of Emby's responsibility.

Maybe it's more useful to know what kind of issues you had before with Jellyfin and Plex so we can see if they're even applicable to Emby?

[rdhardi 42]

@Xoores After an extended internet outage last year, I will say: NO!

You can check out my experience here: 

 

 

[Xoores 3]

@rdhardiOuch, that is precisely what I'm worrying about... And truth to say, the reactions from the Admin there were many things, but positive. Worrying more about few bad actors (who will always be able to circumvent any and all restrictions anyways) more than general usability is worrying to me and I just hope that this is a problem of an individual and that it does not reflect a mindset of the whole team.

 

@brothomPlex is unuseable without an internet connection. It just breaks. Also I really hate that I need to log in through some cloud to access local server. Also I hate to rely on third party services - when they go down (not if), I'm screwed.

Jellyfin is quite fine, but I have some problems with playback (web). When I seek in the movie for the first time, it works just fine. But when I seek the second time, it just rewinds to the start of the movie. And it will keep rewinding until I refresh the page - after that I get that one "first seek" working again It is probably somehow connected with transcoding, because when I disable that, it will work just fine - although 4k movie playback will be choppy. I did not (yet) open any bugs for Jellyfin, was thinking that there might be an alternative & I would not have to debug it, but given what @rdhardiwrote, I'm kinda thinking that Emby may not be the alternative to Jellyfin after all.

 

[ebr 16169]

Hi.  Periodic internet access will be required for any Premiere functionality. This would include any of the TV apps, perhaps, minus the Apple TV or Roku at this time.

We have people who successfully use the system mostly disconnected and just make sure that they can connect periodically to validate.  We have one moderator who lives primarily on a ship .

[Xoores 3]

Hi @ebr, so just to be super sure: the described usecase (data on my NAS, normally online, but randomly offline for some time) should be OK with Emby & work like expected without having to manually do anything (e.g. playing videos on AppleTV and/or few browser-based clients)? I'm unsure whether browser-based clients need transcoding from the premiere suite... And if they do, whether it would keep working when the connection cuts out?

If it works, it would actually be awesome! I was kind of worried that I would have to babysit some app (meaning making sure every few days that it is connected, launched, synchronized with some cloud) or risk that the app would not work when internet suddenly dies

Given the fact, that there are people who run this mostly disconnected gives me hope that this might work I don't necessarily need fully offline solution, although that would be much preferred as I would not rely on some 3rd party servers to be online (especially given the track record of e.g. gaming industry, where killing off the servers seems to be norm - and the subsequent "Stop Killing Games" EU initiative as a response to this). But right now I'd be glad to go for "sometimes-online but fully working even when ISP is down".

Thanks for the response!

Edited August 12, 2025 by Xoores

[Luke 42077]

2 hours ago, Xoores said:

Hi @ebr, so just to be super sure: the described usecase (data on my NAS, normally online, but randomly offline for some time) should be OK with Emby & work like expected without having to manually do anything (e.g. playing videos on AppleTV and/or few browser-based clients)? I'm unsure whether browser-based clients need transcoding from the premiere suite... And if they do, whether it would keep working when the connection cuts out?

If it works, it would actually be awesome! I was kind of worried that I would have to babysit some app (meaning making sure every few days that it is connected, launched, synchronized with some cloud) or risk that the app would not work when internet suddenly dies

Given the fact, that there are people who run this mostly disconnected gives me hope that this might work I don't necessarily need fully offline solution, although that would be much preferred as I would not rely on some 3rd party servers to be online (especially given the track record of e.g. gaming industry, where killing off the servers seems to be norm - and the subsequent "Stop Killing Games" EU initiative as a response to this). But right now I'd be glad to go for "sometimes-online but fully working even when ISP is down".

Thanks for the response!

Hi. Brief hiccups should be fine. It just depends on how long your disconnects are.

Also keep in mind some devices like Roku and Fire TV require an internet connection to run any app, so that requirement isn't coming from Emby.

[Xoores 3]

Hi @Lukewe are talking hours most of the time. A day tops. I just want to play the local library on NAS - nothing else really bothers me

Perfect, I will give it a try & go for a month of Premiere and if everything works, I'll upgrade.

Thanks a lot for clearing this out for me!

[rdhardi 42]

10 hours ago, ebr said:

Hi.  Periodic internet access will be required for any Premiere functionality. This would include any of the TV apps, perhaps, minus the Apple TV or Roku at this time.

We have people who successfully use the system mostly disconnected and just make sure that they can connect periodically to validate.  We have one moderator who lives primarily on a ship .

I remember reading your posts about needing "periodic" internet access...but that was AFTER my 23-day outage. At that point, I was so busy dealing with after-effects of hurricane damage on our property that I never researched any further.

We used moblie hotspots for wi-fi connections to our laptops during the outage. So, question for you: If I connect my iPhone directly with USB (via hotspot ) to my Emby server and login, will that be enough to validate my Premiere license when my ISP is down? Once it validates, would I then be able to disconnect the hotspot and access locally via my Shield (for a week or two...and then repeat?)

Edited August 13, 2025 by rdhardi
Changed wording, damage instead of destruction

[TeamB 2438]

17 hours ago, Neminem said:

No.

If you have premier the server and premier app's needs to phone home via internet to verify License.

But without premier and only using the free app's ( Browser, Ruko, smart tv or Apple TV ) it might work for you.

Check this for further guidance 

Emby Premiere Feature Matrix | Emby Documentation

kodi is also an option

[rdhardi 42]

26 minutes ago, TeamB said:

kodi is also an option

If I remember correctly, we used Kodi years ago back when my husband first set up emby (probably back in win 7/media browser days). I wasn't really into Emby at that point & I stayed on cable with a cable card for Emby until a few years ago.

So, kodi will work without interent access or "phoning home"?

Edited August 13, 2025 by rdhardi

[TeamB 2438]

13 minutes ago, rdhardi said:

If I remember correctly, we used Kodi years ago back when my husband first set up emby (probably back in win 7/media browser days). I wasn't really into Emby at that point & I stayed on cable with a cable card for Emby until a few years ago.

So, kodi will work without interent access or "phoning home"?

yes, Kodi is one of the free clients.
You have two options for Kodi addons that support Emby as a media playback source, well 3 if you want to include DLNA

 

[rdhardi 42]

3 minutes ago, TeamB said:

yes, Kodi is one of the free clients.
You have two options for Kodi addons that support Emby as a media playback source, well 3 if you want to include DLNA

 

Thanks! I'll check it out this weekend. Hopefully, I'll never have an almost month-long internet outage again, but if I do, I want to be prepared!

[brothom 177]

@Lukesay I have a premiere server and the internet disconnects for x-many days and the license is removed, doesn't this just disable the premiere functionalities?

If I were to have that server available in my LAN and still be able to reach it via the local network, I would still be able to use that Emby server, just not the premiere parts right?

So even offline, the Emby server should continue working but just not the components that require you to be online which are additionals?