I’m currently looking to self host some photos to get my girlfriend off of Google Photos. I’m wondering what has been good in your experience.
I never thought about self-hosting the before but a LTT video (I’m sorry) popped up in my feed and I got curious.
I looked into Ente.io and PhotoSync so far but unsure if there are any better options. Also saw that LibrePhotos exist but I haven’t looked into it yet.
What are you using? Have you had any issues? Missing features etc.?
Yeah, this is why I jumped ship to Immich last year. I was donating to PP, with the understanding that donating users would get access to multi-user features when they happened.
Then they put them behind a paid recurring subscription. For self-hosted users. That move broke all the trust with me.
However, because of the fast dev cycle, it has a lot of breaking changes, and needs regular maintenance (most notably for me, postgres docker changes. Especially if you are not giving it it’s own postgres instance and using their provided docker compose.)
You could stay pegged to a single version, but the mobile app also doesn’t have full backwards compatibility with server versions, which results in a slew of other problems (how do I do a fresh install of an older app version on a new device?)
But if you are willing to keep up and perform semi-regular maintenance, immich is great, and the rapid dev cycle means more new features faster!
I’m scared to these ‘breaking changes’ even though I’m not exactly a self hosting newbie. That’s because I don’t have a proper 3-2-1 backup and I’m afraid I might lose my photos or settings. I’ve been exploring of setting up immich through a homeserver management tool like runtipi that allows taking backups separately that can be reverted to, in case something goes wrong. Anyone aware of any negatives about that?
My parents like it, once every so often I update their docker and apps (on the same day). Its not always straight forward (I just mean you have to visit their github), but ez enough.
Unfortunately my next choice (afaik) would be NextCloud … aaaand let’s leave it at that.
Thank you! I will try Immich our and see how it feels, if it’s just quick fixes it shouldn’t be an issue. But if it’s too much I might just try out Ente 🙏
It wasn’t that the upgrades were hard so much as it felt like everytime I tried to open the app on my phone, it errored out because either it or the server needed to be upgraded and the versions weren’t compatible.
I don’t know why people recommend Immich. I found it to be the most bare-bone photo app I’ve ever used. It feels ten+ years old. I tried really hard to make it work but Plex photos is about 20% better and it still sucks.
I don’t remember much about plex photos, but facial (and object) recognition, photo map, easy sharing through albums (without the other person needing an account), and being open source are some features I imagine plex photos does not have.
it seems barebones still, because it is a very young app, and the UI is not great, especially on mobile.
It is the best replacement for Google photos that I have seen though.
Fair enough. Plex may not have the bells and whistles but it’s simple and intuitive to use. I’ve also tried the QuMagie app on my QNAP which does have all those features but found it to be a bit more cumbersome than it was worth.
I tried Google Photos briefly as well and was very shocked at how bad it is, compared to Apple Photos. It took me several days just to figure out how to delete more than one picture at a time. I have to assume it’s much more robust on an Android than on an iPhone but even their web interface was horrible.
Depending on what exactly you’re looking for, Photostructure might be a good option. It’s got a great UI for viewing photos, and it’s meant to play well with other Metadata software.
It wasn’t sold, it’s being funded. There’s a big difference. And the group behind the funding is a huge supporter of FOSS. They’re gonna be “selling” immich licenses soon, but they’re also going to keep all the source code open and available for anyone to download, modify, or use however they want.
The owner of the name and repo has changed hands in exchange for money, and is now going to be pushing licences to use it. You can say that is not “sold” if you like, but its the same to me.
It literally didn’t. Read about it and stop spreading misinformation. The deal is essentially like an investment. The developer still maintains full autonomy on the projects direction and leadership. All FUTO is doing is providing them stable income so they can work full time on developing the project.
Definitely check this summary out: https://meichthys.github.io/foss_photo_libraries/. Everyone’s use case and priorities will be a little different, but I’d vote for Immich as a Google Photos replacement that looks nice and is very easy to use. I was awestruck by the facial and object recognition, which wasn’t even a feature I particularly cared about.
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This is the correct answer
I use Photoprism, mainly because it seems stable so far, and it’s good enough for my needs
Same here, Been using photoprism past few years also, loving it so far!! Few quirks but constantly being worked on
Ditto, though I’m getting more and more resentful by the day at the lack of multi user support. I’m not going to donate to them again.
Yeah, this is why I jumped ship to Immich last year. I was donating to PP, with the understanding that donating users would get access to multi-user features when they happened.
Then they put them behind a paid recurring subscription. For self-hosted users. That move broke all the trust with me.
They fucking what? I need to get off the couch and cancel my support too
Yep - they introduced paid subscription tiers and put multi-user support into those: https://www.photoprism.app/editions#compare
Same, just use FolderSync to get photos to it. Works like a cham.
i m m i c h
I love this app.
Immich is by far the best and most convenient.
/end of thread
As we used to say.
+1 to immich
However, because of the fast dev cycle, it has a lot of breaking changes, and needs regular maintenance (most notably for me, postgres docker changes. Especially if you are not giving it it’s own postgres instance and using their provided docker compose.)
You could stay pegged to a single version, but the mobile app also doesn’t have full backwards compatibility with server versions, which results in a slew of other problems (how do I do a fresh install of an older app version on a new device?)
But if you are willing to keep up and perform semi-regular maintenance, immich is great, and the rapid dev cycle means more new features faster!
Can you make immich so that when you click on the map, you get a grid of relevant photos rather than full size swipe?
Can you make immich not show the stupid white lines around every country?
I’m scared to these ‘breaking changes’ even though I’m not exactly a self hosting newbie. That’s because I don’t have a proper 3-2-1 backup and I’m afraid I might lose my photos or settings. I’ve been exploring of setting up immich through a homeserver management tool like runtipi that allows taking backups separately that can be reverted to, in case something goes wrong. Anyone aware of any negatives about that?
You can directly use the files from the github repo, just look for the release your server is on and install that apk.
This is a fair description.
My parents like it, once every so often I update their docker and apps (on the same day). Its not always straight forward (I just mean you have to visit their github), but ez enough.
Unfortunately my next choice (afaik) would be NextCloud … aaaand let’s leave it at that.
Thank you! I will try Immich our and see how it feels, if it’s just quick fixes it shouldn’t be an issue. But if it’s too much I might just try out Ente 🙏
Luckily all of the changes so far have been super easy and quick, they’re very good about posting detailed info on what to change.
Everyone seems to love immich, but I found the rapid development cycle combined with the version incompatibilities annoying.
Ente is seeming like a nice alternative so far and will hopefully be lower maintenance.
I think Immich has grown out of the most difficult upgrades now. Most changes now are just removing lines from the stack.
It wasn’t that the upgrades were hard so much as it felt like everytime I tried to open the app on my phone, it errored out because either it or the server needed to be upgraded and the versions weren’t compatible.
Thank you all for the responses! I will take look into Immich and if maintenance is too much of a hassle I might try out Ente!
I don’t know why people recommend Immich. I found it to be the most bare-bone photo app I’ve ever used. It feels ten+ years old. I tried really hard to make it work but Plex photos is about 20% better and it still sucks.
I don’t remember much about plex photos, but facial (and object) recognition, photo map, easy sharing through albums (without the other person needing an account), and being open source are some features I imagine plex photos does not have.
it seems barebones still, because it is a very young app, and the UI is not great, especially on mobile.
It is the best replacement for Google photos that I have seen though.
Fair enough. Plex may not have the bells and whistles but it’s simple and intuitive to use. I’ve also tried the QuMagie app on my QNAP which does have all those features but found it to be a bit more cumbersome than it was worth.
I tried Google Photos briefly as well and was very shocked at how bad it is, compared to Apple Photos. It took me several days just to figure out how to delete more than one picture at a time. I have to assume it’s much more robust on an Android than on an iPhone but even their web interface was horrible.
Depending on what exactly you’re looking for, Photostructure might be a good option. It’s got a great UI for viewing photos, and it’s meant to play well with other Metadata software.
I-fucking-mmich!
Piwigo.
I tried Immich but did not like it, its also been sold so who know what will happen there. I have been using Nextcloud and loving it
It wasn’t sold, it’s being funded. There’s a big difference. And the group behind the funding is a huge supporter of FOSS. They’re gonna be “selling” immich licenses soon, but they’re also going to keep all the source code open and available for anyone to download, modify, or use however they want.
The owner of the name and repo has changed hands in exchange for money, and is now going to be pushing licences to use it. You can say that is not “sold” if you like, but its the same to me.
It literally didn’t. Read about it and stop spreading misinformation. The deal is essentially like an investment. The developer still maintains full autonomy on the projects direction and leadership. All FUTO is doing is providing them stable income so they can work full time on developing the project.
It’s not misinformation. I hear what you’re saying, and that this whole Futo thing seems like it should be net positive, but it was sold.
This isn’t a good argument for Immich not being sold, because this is the exact description of what private equity firms do.
Definitely check this summary out: https://meichthys.github.io/foss_photo_libraries/. Everyone’s use case and priorities will be a little different, but I’d vote for Immich as a Google Photos replacement that looks nice and is very easy to use. I was awestruck by the facial and object recognition, which wasn’t even a feature I particularly cared about.
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