Description

Editor's Review

By Sarah Johnson, Senior Security Analyst

Free streaming media server

Plex Media Server turns the scattered audio/video files on your PC into a tidy, stream-ready library. It ships with industry-leading decoders, automatically fetches posters and metadata, and lets you create multiple smart or shuffled playlists so you can find what you want to watch—fast.

Plex Media Server Highlights

Unique cataloguing: automatically renames, artwork-wraps and classifies videos so your “home-movies” folder looks like Netflix.
Universal search & watch: TV episodes, films, music and photos are searchable from any phone, tablet, TV, console or browser, at home or away.
Local-first playback: hardware-accelerated decoding starts instantly and stays stutter-free, even with 4K HDR files.
Next-gen streaming: adaptive bitrate, offline sync and chapter thumbnails lift the viewing experience to premium levels.
Clean, elegant UI: content is presented intuitively; navigation feels natural and lightning-fast.

Core Functions

Tame media chaos: point Plex at a folder and it sorts everything by type, year, genre or cast.
Share with care: grant friends/family access to chosen libraries while keeping private stuff private.
Enjoy offline: sync movies, music or photos to mobiles for plane-ride playback.
User control: set up managed accounts for kids or room-mates, complete with age ratings and viewing restrictions.

Quick-start Guide

Install Plex Media Server on Windows, macOS, Linux, NAS, NVIDIA SHIELD or Docker.
Add libraries (Movies, TV, Music, Photos); Plex scrapes artwork and metadata automatically.
Install the Plex app on any client—smart-TV, phone, tablet, console, browser.
Press Play. Plex streams (or transcodes) from your server to that device, anywhere you have internet.

Example: share Chicago home-videos to grandma’s Roku in France; continue a TV show on your iPad in Tenerife; pipe music from a London PC to your Android phone on the train.

Supported Media & Platforms

File types: MP4, MKV, AVI, MOV, DIVX, HEVC, MP3, M4A, FLAC, WMA, JPG, PNG, RAW, TBN and more.
Server OS: Windows, macOS, Linux, FreeBSD, Docker, NVIDIA SHIELD, select Netgear routers, NAS from Synology, QNAP, TerraMaster, Drobo, unRAID, etc.

Step-by-step Setup

Download the installer from plex.tv and run it.
Open a browser to http://localhost:32400/web, sign in (or create) a free Plex account and finish the wizard—name your server, add at least one media folder.
Install the client app on your phone/TV/tablet, sign in, and stream.
(Optional) Organise files as /Media/Movies, /Media/TV; use the naming convention Movie (year).ext or Show - S01E01 - title.ext for best metadata matching.

Once set-up, you can also add DVR (record live TV), link TIDAL for 60 M tracks, or integrate automation tools like Sonarr/Radarr for automatic downloads.

Price & Licence

Core server and most client apps are free. Premium features (hardware transcoding, DVR, offline mobile sync) require a Plex Pass subscription, but basic streaming, sharing and library management cost nothing.