Easy stremio on Docker

Introduction

Stremio is a free application which lets you stream your favorite shows and movies.

The Docker images in this repository bundle stremio-server, ffmpeg and web player for you, ready to use in a small Alpine image.

I built this to run Stremio on my Raspberry Pi 5 and couldn't find something that has both player and server but also the official image seemed too big but also lacks the Web Player and doesn't work out of the box if no HTTPS is configured.

Features

Idea here is to have both Stremio web player and server run on the same container and if IPADDRESS env variable is set generate a certificate and use it for both.

Both the Web player and server run on port 8080 behind nginx. One does not need to expose server port anymore. You can set AUTO_SERVER_URL or SERVER_URL to avoid setting the server manually.

---

1. If you exposed the port 8080 for HTTP just point your streaming server (http://{LAN IP}:8080/) in settings to the lan ip address and set the server to be http://{LAN IP}:8080/ and enjoy. Make sure you set NO_CORS=1 with this option.

This is the easy option since there is no need to setup dns or have an external ip. Do not set the IPADDRESS env variable if you just want HTTP. No need to expose port 12470 with this setup option but you will only be able to use the webplayer with HTTP.

docker run -d \
  --name=stremio-docker \
  -e NO_CORS=1 \
  -e AUTO_SERVER_URL=1 \
  -p 8080:8080 \
  tsaridas/stremio-docker:latest

---

2. If you set your public IP address for the IPADDRESS environment variable, then the Stremio server should automatically set the certificate to the wildcard *.519b6502d940.stremio.rocks and should generate an A record for your public IP address. Alternatively you can set the value of IPADDRESS to 0-0-0-0 to automatically get your public ip address. You should then expose port 8080 to your servers and then setup port forwarding to your router to point these two ports to your server. Once this is done you can point the WebPlayer to your streaming server on port 8080.

To find the FQDN that the certificate is pointing to, look at the folder you mounted for a file with a .pem extension. The filename is the domain you need to add to your hosts in case of local ip address.

If you setup the IPADDRESS environment variable to 0-0-0-0 the container will automatically try to get your public IP address and setup the certificates and DNS. This won't work for IPv6.

docker run -d \
  --name=stremio-docker \
  -e NO_CORS=1 \
  -e AUTO_SERVER_URL=1 \
  -e IPADDRESS=0-0-0-0
  -p 8080:8080 \
  tsaridas/stremio-docker:latest

---

3. If you set IPADDRESS to your private ip address then the server should still set the certificate to the wildcard *.519b6502d940.stremio.rocks and have the subdomain set as 192-168-1-10 assuming your private ip is 192.168.1.10. Full domain should look like 192-168-1-10.519b6502d940.stremio.rocks. You can then setup your /etc/hosts in Linux or c:\Windows\System32\Drivers\etc\hosts in windows to point that host to your lan address like :

192.168.1.10    192-168-1-10.519b6502d940.stremio.rocks # this is an example. set your own ip and fqdn here.

Then you can point your browser to https://192-168-1-10.519b6502d940.stremio.rocks:8080 and setup Streaming server to https://192-168-1-10.519b6502d940.stremio.rocks:8080 .

To find the FQDN that the certificate is pointing to, look at the folder you mounted for a file with a .pem extension. The filename is the domain you need to add to your hosts in case of local ip address.

---

4. If you want to use your own custom certificate and domain, you can specify them using the CERT_FILE and DOMAIN environment variables. The server and web player will load the specified certificate.

$ docker run -d \
  --name=stremio-docker \
  -e CERT_FILE=certificate.pem \
  -e DOMAIN=your.custom.domain \
  -v ~/.stremio-server:/root/.stremio-server \
  -p 8080:8080/tcp \
  -p 12470:12470/tcp \
  --restart unless-stopped \
  tsaridas/stremio-docker:latest

Make sure the certificate file is placed in the same folder that you expose in /root/.stremio-server. For example, if your certificate is located at ~/.stremio-server/certificate.pem on your host machine, it will be accessible inside the container at /root/.stremio-server/certificate.pem.

The WebPlayer will be available at https://your.custom.domain:8080 and the streaming server at https://your.custom.domain:12470.

---

Thoughts

You don't need to have both Stremio Server and Web Player running. One could use the Stremio web player (https://app.strem.io/#/). Stremio's web player should also work for options 2 and 3 above because the web player requires that the server's URL is in HTTPS.

You can also use the native clients for options 2-3 since they use https but those clients also run a server so there is no point doing this.

Another option is to use an External Media player like VLC or any other supported by stremio to avoid transcoding on the docker container. This would help if you don't have GPU transcoding or some other good CPU.

Shell

I added stremio shell html files under http(s)://{Your stremio url}:{port}/shell/ . One should be able to get the old online stremio version of the files that are in app.stremio.io. Defaults to the normal webplayer on the root "/". I have had issues playing youtube videos with these files though and I assume so will you.

Requirements

• A host with Docker installed.

Installation

1. Install Docker

If you haven't installed Docker yet, install it by running:

$ curl -sSL https://get.docker.com | sh
$ sudo usermod -aG docker $(whoami)
$ exit

And log in again.

2. Run Stremio Web + Server

Option A: Using Docker Compose (Recommended)

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/tsaridas/stremio-docker.git
cd stremio-docker

# Edit compose.yaml if needed, then run:
docker-compose up -d

The compose file includes common settings like NO_CORS: 1 and AUTO_SERVER_URL: 1.

Option B: Using Docker Run

$ docker run -d \
  --name=stremio-docker \
  -e NO_CORS=1 \
  -e AUTO_SERVER_URL=1 \
  -v ~/.stremio-server:/root/.stremio-server \
  -p 8080:8080/tcp \
  --restart unless-stopped \
  tsaridas/stremio-docker:latest

The Web UI will now be available on http://YOUR_SERVER_IP:8080. Streaming server will be auto-setup for you from the url of the browser you are opening it.

💡 Your configuration files and cache will be saved in ~/.stremio-server

Options

These options can be configured by setting environment variables using -e KEY="VALUE" in the docker run command.

Env	Default	Example	Description
IPADDRESS	-	192.168.1.10	Set this to a valid IPv4 in order to enable https and generate certificates with stremio domain. If you set this to 0-0-0-0 it will try to automatically get your public ip. Getting the public ip and DNS is not reliable and might need multiple retries. It will not work for IPv6
SERVER_URL	-	http://192.168.1.10:11470/	Set this to set server url automatically to what you want. If you change the default url in the UI script will change it back to what you defined here and page will be reloaded
AUTO_SERVER_URL	0	1	Set this to set server url automatically taken from the url of the browser. If you change the default url in the UI script will change it back to what you defined here and page will be reloaded
NO_CORS	-	1	Set to disable server's cors
CASTING_DISABLED	-	1	Set to disable casting. You should set this to 1 if you're getting SSDP errors in the logs
WEBUI_LOCATION	-	http://192.168.1.10:8080	Sets the redirect page for web player and automatically sets up streaming server for you when one tries to access server at port 11470 or 12470. Default is https://app.strem.io/shell-v4.4/
WEBUI_INTERNAL_PORT	8080	9090	Sets the port inside the docker container for the web player
FFMPEG_BIN	-	/usr/bin/	Set for custom ffmpeg bin path
FFPROBE_BIN	-	/usr/bin/	Set for custom ffprobe bin path
APP_PATH	-	/srv/stremio-path/	Set for custom path for stremio server. Server will always save cache to /root/.stremio-server though so it's only for its config files.
DOMAIN	-	your.custom.domain	Set for custom domain for stremio server. Server will use the specified domain for the web player and streaming server. This should match the certificate and cannot be applied without specifying CERT_FILE
CERT_FILE	-	certificate.pem	Set for custom certificate path. The server and web player will load the specified certificate.
USERNAME	-	myusername	Set for custom username for http simple authentication.
PASSWORD	-	Mypassword	Set for custom password for http simple authentication.
DISABLE_CACHING	-	1	Disable caching for server if set to 1.

There are multiple other options defined but probably best not setting any.

Updating

To update to the latest version, simply run:

docker stop stremio-docker
docker rm stremio-docker
docker pull tsaridas/stremio-docker:latest

And then run the docker run -d \ ... command above again.

FFMPEG

We build our own ffmpeg from jellyfin repo with version 4.4.1-4. This includes:

• Hardware acceleration support for both Intel and AMD (VAAPI)
• Multiple codec support (H.264, HEVC, VP9, etc.)
• Optimized for streaming workloads

Hardware acceleration is automatically detected and enabled when supported devices are available. Due to alpine missing glibc nvidia transcoding would probably not work.

FFMPEG add configure options

You could build your own image with extra ffmpeg configure options. Your new option will probably require that you have the -dev libraries installed for alpine.

If you cannot find the -dev libraries in the alpine repo then you might need to compile them as well.

  xvidcore-dev \
  fdk-aac-dev \
  libva-dev \
  git \
  x264 `ADD-DEV-PACKAGE-HERE` && \

Add your extra options at the end line before the && :

--prefix=/usr/lib/jellyfin-ffmpeg --extra-version=Jellyfin --disable-doc --disable-ffplay --disable-shared --disable-libxcb --disable-sdl2 --disable-xlib --enable-lto --enable-gpl --enable-version3 --enable-gmp --enable-gnutls --enable-libdrm --enable-libass --enable-libfreetype --enable-libfribidi --enable-libfontconfig --enable-libbluray --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libopus --enable-libtheora --enable-libvorbis --enable-libdav1d --enable-libwebp --enable-libvpx --enable-libx264 --enable-libx265  --enable-libzimg --enable-small --enable-nonfree --enable-libxvid --enable-libaom --enable-libfdk_aac --enable-vaapi --enable-hwaccel=h264_vaapi --toolchain=hardened `ADD-OPTION-HERE` &&

You also add the dev libraries to the above line from configure where you see lots of -dev packages installed. Those packages are purged later so you will also need to install the normal library (not the headers) in the end.

apk add --no-cache libwebp libvorbis x265-libs x264-libs libass opus libgmpxx lame-libs gnutls libvpx libtheora libdrm libbluray zimg libdav1d aom-libs xvidcore fdk-aac curl libva `ADD-NON-DEV-PACKAGE-HERE` && \

The lines shown above might have changed so just try to use common sense on where to add your package. If you want hardware acceleration you might need to compile it with the driver for your hardware. The version of ffmpeg that we compile comes with (VA-API)[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_Acceleration_API]. You will probably need to expose your hardware device inside the container in order to make it work. Server tries to see if it can use any devices on first start. You can see those log messages to see if it worked for you.

Support for Intel/AMD CPU/GPU Transcoding

If you have an Intel/AMD CPU/GPU and you are running Linux make sure you have the latest/nightly version of the container you can expose the devices to have hardware transcoding capabilities via VAAPI :

/dev/dri/card0
/dev/dri/renderD128

docker compose :

devices:
  - "/dev/dri/card0:/dev/dri/card0"
  - "/dev/dri/renderD128:/dev/dri/renderD128"

cli :

 --device /dev/dri/renderD128:/dev/dri/renderD128 --device /dev/dri/card0:/dev/dri/card0

If you have some other device that you would like to add drivers for please reach out.

Builds

Builds are setup to make images for the below archs:

• linux/amd64
• linux/arm/v6
• linux/arm/v7
• linux/arm64/v8
• linux/ppc64le

Images are automatically built and tested on pull requests using GitHub Actions with comprehensive end-to-end testing.

Build tags

• latest -> Builds automatically when new version of server or WebPlayer is released. Builds WebPlayer only from release tags.
• nightly -> Builds automatically daily from development branch of web player and gets latest version of server.
• release version (example v1.0.0) -> to have old releases available in case there is something wrong with new release.

Images saved in Docker Hub

Build your own

You can build your own image by running the below command. By default it will build from development branch of web player and latest version of the server. If you want to build from latest release of web please you can add --build-arg BRANCH=release or the branch that you want.

docker build -t stremio:myserver .

Advanced usage for customizing local storage

Stremio's web application stores configuration data, such as login information and addon settings, in the browser's local storage. To automate these configurations or use your own custom settings, you can modify the localStorage.json file and pass it to the container. Under the hood, there is a script running trying to load the values of this file.

To do this, first edit the localStorage.json file to include your desired configurations. Then, when running the container, use the following volume mount to pass your custom localStorage.json file to the container:

-v ~/localStorage.json:/srv/stremio-server/build/localStorage.json

This ensures that Stremio starts with your custom configuration settings.

Known issues

• Unable to login through facebook.

Common Use Cases

• Using HTTP
• Using HTTPS Local IP
• Using HTTPS Public IP
• Using HTTPS with custom certificate

Useful links

Stremio addons Stremio addons Beta

Suggestions

I recommend setting up dnsmasq or similar to cache your dns queries since Stremio seems to be spamming with requests to trackers.

The config option you need with dnsmasq is :

cache-size=10000

then you set your dns server to the ip address of your dns caching server and you are set.

Additionally there is the restart_if_idle.sh script that will restart stremio server if it is idle. You can add the below healthcheck to your docker compose file.

  healthcheck:
    test: ["CMD-SHELL", "./restart_if_idle.sh"]
    interval: 1h
    start_period: 1h
    retries: 1

Security

• HTTP Basic Authentication is supported via USERNAME and PASSWORD environment variables
• Automatic certificate generation for HTTPS deployments
• CORS can be disabled for local deployments
• All images are built with minimal dependencies and security updates

ToDo

• Build another image with base something that is small and has glibc
• Automatically add addons passed from enviromental variables

I don't intend to spend much time on this and tried to automate as much as I had time to. PRs and Issues are welcome. If you find some issue please do let me know.