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I have run Jellyfin for about 3 years. Plex has a lot of community support and praise so I spun up a test instance. Unfortunately for Jellyfin, Plex is much most reliable for me in pretty much every way. I would love for Jellyfin to keep improving but the switch to Plex just made the media experience so much nicer.
I run both concurrently. I have a plex pass from way back when, maybe a decade or more.
What plex is now is not what it once was. Trying to socialize viewing habits, opting in by default to analysis, ads, reviews, and sharing that info has gone too far. Plex also works on these features such as discovery which benefits them, instead of open bugs.
That us why I can't recommend it.
As for a feature comparison. Jellyfin is snappier, and faster. Plex is more detailed in their interface, and has better Metadata. Jellyfin sometimes doesn't restart where I left off. Jellyfin is much, much better on mobile devices, but has less clients for tv's. Jellyfin doesn't rely on any server but my own, where plex wants to authenticate with thier own servers and ask for accounts (and money) to have full functionality. Jellyfin always downloads to a client. Plex...might. Plex has better handling of multiple streams in one file.
I’ll ask the questions I ask Jellyfin users that, if they’re all (or mostly) yes will get me (and a lot of other people) to switch:
Does Jellyfin have:
Music filtering/smart playlists?
Sonic analysis of music to generate smart playlists?
Good 4k/x265 performance?
A third party (or built in) utility that shows me streaming usage per person? (Think Tautulli) Allows me to limit remote users to streaming from a single IP address at a time?
Let’s me watch something together with another remote user?
Has an app for most any device (like Plex or Emby) that does NOT require sideloading?
Has built in native DVR steaming/recording support?
Two factor authentication?
Doesn’t default new clients to 720p for remote streaming?
Easy login of other devices by entering in a randomly generated four character code?
Pyrosis did a great job answering a lot of your questions, I will focus again on why I cannot recommend plex:
Opt-In is not acceptable. You need to opt-out of: data sharing, data sharing with partners (unless you are in the UK or specific States), sharing playback data, stopping discovery together and activity feed, and turning off all of their live tv and streaming services.
Sharing streaming habits with others is not something that ever should have been opt-out. They keep pushing the line.
By the way, several of the "features" you mention are not included by default. Hardware decoding, downloads, DVR, etc.
Fair point and agree 100%.
Never made any mention that they were there by default; I’m asking if they exist.
Music playlists are different from Plex. You can create them import them or generate an instant list.
4k is seamless and performs better imo. You can use transcoding or not if you have files they way you want them. If you do you can select on a per user basis who gets to transcode.
You can set bandwidth limits.
I've seen a feature to allow multi user streaming the same movie so you ig watch at the same time. I use npm and often a couple peeps might watch a movie at the same time without using this feature and works fine
I use the client app on Android and a firestick atm. I think I just downloaded it but you can side load too if you want. The media server app is available for various os. So technically you could set it up on whatever you want. Just check your app store
https://jellyfin.org/downloads/clients/
It can plug into homebrew or m3u playlists for live tv if that is your suggestion. It has a plugin for nextpvr and tvheadend if you utilize those for over the air or already have an m3u setup too in those pvr services. Those are great btw and available in docker containers.
It always defaulted to what I have my files encoded. It absolutely can transcode to support other clients and you decide preferences. I did notice since most of my files are h.264 with few h265 sometimes it helped to turn off transcoding for me because the client supported it natively. Jellyfin was transcoding h265 mkv to like an MP4. Anyway a quirk
Login is pretty simple. Passwords users can change. Has codes it can generate to approve a new device if you are already logged into an app on your phone. Like 6 temp numbers. Can also setup pins or whatever they call them under users.
I was going to reply to this and then decided I don’t care anymore.