Really wanted to like Jellyfin but it just can’t replace plex yet for me. Once it’s developed a little more I’ll definitely take another look since plex is shitting the bed.
this post was submitted on 01 Feb 2026
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People into Jellyfin use smart TVs? I haven't connected mine to the internet.
Not every Jellyfin user is also the server administrator. If someone sets up a server and shares that server with 5 people, most of those users aren't concerned with the privacy implications of how they connect to the server; they just want to consume content as easily as they do with Netflix, Disney, etc.
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I do? I don't love Android TV but I only have so much time to fight to the good fight with shit.
I would like a less smart tv but I don't want to by a 7 year old Nvidia Shield and suffered paralysis by analysis trying to decide on on an Android TV box.
So here we are, I use jellyfin on a smart TV
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Having a smart tv doesn't mean you must use internet to utilize it. Mine is blocked from internet connectivity but connects to my media server on the local network. If anything, I prefer this so I don't need an extra computer sitting in the living room and can instead use the same single media server my phones and computers do.
This feels like some really niche gatekeeping.
Family connect to my server with tv. If tv is in the same house everything is blocked and select things are whitelisted.
We have both.
Kodi use Jellyfin for its media library and Kodi is excellent for a lot of the TV we watch. catch Up TV has replaced the decoder for watching terrestrial TV.
One thing that sucks in Kodi though is Arte (a franco-german channel that is a leans towards "intellectual"). For that, the LG WebOS app is much better than the Kodi add-on. Other than that 1 app, we could happily plug Kodi into digital signage panel if they weren't stupidly expensive.
It's relatively easy to restrict a smart tv to TLS/HTTPS traffic only using your router and a dns adblocker.
How does it help to let the smart tv talk via encrypted channels?
no it helps to block everything that isnt just netflix or whatever streaming service you use. you combine a DNS adblock along with blocking all the unused ports and it severely limits the communications. you could also add a vpn to add another layer of security. idk about jellyfin but most streaming services i know use https/443 to stream to your tv. so youre only allowing the specific service you want and only on a specific port. buncha great dns blocklists here https://github.com/hagezi/dns-blocklists, and a smart tv specific one for pihole here https://github.com/Perflyst/PiHoleBlocklist/blob/master/SmartTV.txt
Hardcoded IPS circumvent DNS blocks.
Restricting ports doesn't do anything since the TV isn't running a service, it is contacting one.
Correct me if I am wrong.
Not sure if you mean hardcoded DNS IPs or hardcoded "phone home" IPs. Hardcoded DNS addresses in devices are annoying, the only way i've found to get around that is using destination nat rules (DNAT) which requires more than a consumer router typically. hardcoded phone home IPs would get blocked by your firewall. you're right that most firewalls are set up by default to implicitly allow outbound traffic. you set up a rule that explicitly denies all outbound traffic from the TV, then only allow port 443 (or whatever port your streaming service uses) on the specific IP/IPs that your service uses. Here's Netflix's published IP info for example.
edit also i'm fully aware it's fucking ridiculous that we as consumers have to go through this much rigamarole. you shouldnt have to be a literal network engineer to do something as simple as have an internet-connected tv that doesnt spy on you.
Ah that makes sense! Thank you
I had to practically hack my Samsung TV I order to get jellyfin on it. A little annoyed it took this long but at least its there now.
There's a funny one-click tool here: https://github.com/Jellyfin2Samsung/Samsung-Jellyfin-Installer but I guess it's not necessary anymore
Damn that looks like it would have saved me some time.
I'm still not connecting NY TV to any network, local or otherwise.
Apparently they will try to connect to open networks and try to tunnel through to get internet, so I set bogus manual DNS, gateway, and ip info so it can't connect to anything correctly.
If they're going so far as scanning open networks & tunneling, why would they bother obeying dns gateways you specify?
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Game changer
Just run a small linux pc and a wireless keyboard+mouse
I use libux btw
My gosh I just searched for libux, thinking maybe there was a great new Linux user experience out there for my media library. I even got confused for a split second when it autocorrected my search to Linux before realising the typo
I use libuv btw.
I use pibtv btw.
I'd rather use an Android TV box, so I can have Dolby Vision, etc.
Wait, I don't have to update it through dev mode?
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread:
| Fewer Letters | More Letters |
|---|---|
| DNS | Domain Name Service/System |
| IP | Internet Protocol |
| NAS | Network-Attached Storage |
| Plex | Brand of media server package |
4 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 4 acronyms.
[Thread #55 for this comm, first seen 2nd Feb 2026, 19:20] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]
Wow this is great news!
Literally just went through getting the app built /deployed for my parents and my partner's parents using the old method a few weeks ago. I'm super glad the app is on the app store, but it's just bad timing for me lol
Omfg. I love you. 😭. I tried this very last week to make it work through their workaround and it never wanted to work out. Thank you so much bringing this up.
I only own one Samsung TV. Its a really smart TV. Its magnificent. It never switches input which is a good thing since I never need to. This is because it has no built in services of the so called 'smart tv's"
Kodi running on an (old) Nvidia Shield Pro, reading from a NAS via dlnr. This works nicely and I don't get any quality degradation... Except for HDR+ which the shield doesn't support and I was stupid and bought a Samsung TV, which is bad for numerous reasons, but also this one.
And of course, we are now closing in on the decade since it was released, and still no viable replacement.
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