By Wells Lucas Santo — 16 Dec 2025

Setting up a personal music server (Navidrome)

My Navidrome music server running on the Feishin music client

Tired of using Spotify? Want to listen to your personal music library on all your different devices? This is a step-by-step guide on setting up your own personal music server that you can stream your music from. I've written this guide so that you can set it up right away, using only free services, and without needing to code or use command line. Let's get started!

Part one: Getting the server running on your computer

The free software we will be using that runs the music server is called Navidrome. We will run it using a free application called Docker.

There are a few different options you can use to run a free music server, including Navidrome, Jellyfin, and Subsonic. There are also paid services you can use like Emby and Plex. While Navidrome is specifically designed for your music collection, these other options also allow you to serve other types of media, such as videos! This guide will only go over Navidrome specifically, but if you're into running your own movie/show server as well, I recommend checking some of the other options as well.

I. Install Docker

These steps work for MacOS (Intel), MacOS (Apple Silicon), Windows, and Linux. Docker is a product that allows you to run applications across different devices in a contained and consistent way.

In your web browser, go to the Docker website
Download Docker Desktop for your operating system
Install Docker Desktop
Run Docker

The first time you run Docker, you might be asked to update some files on your computer. Follow the instructions that pop up if prompted. You may also be asked to log in — this is optional, and you can click "Skip" on the top right of the dialog box.

II. Pull the Navidrome Image

Once Docker is installed and running, we will get the Navidrome image that we will use to run the server. While Navidrome is the name of the software we'll be using, the Navidrome "image" tells Docker how to set it up to run on your computer.

In Docker Desktop, click on "Docker Hub" in the left sidebar
Search for "Navidrome"
Select the "deluan/navidrome" page
Click on "Pull" at the top of the page

III. Run Navidrome

Once you have the Navidrome image in Docker, it's time to configure and run it!

In Docker Desktop, click on "Images" in the left sidebar
If you followed "Pull the Docker Image" correctly, you should have the image listed in this page under the name "deluan/navidrome"
Under "Actions," hit the play button to get ready to run the server
In the "Run a new container" screen, click on "Optional settings" so we can set where your music library is. This assumes that your music library is currently on the computer that you are running Docker on.
Under "Ports" enter "4533" in the "Host port" field
Under "Volumes" click on the three dots in "Host path" to select the folder where all of your music is
Under "Volumes" enter "/music" in the "Container path" field
Hit "Run" and Docker will now launch a container running Navidrome!

In your web browser, you should now be able to go to http://127.0.0.1:4533/ to access the Navidrome server. It's important to make sure that this page loads properly before you continue.

IV. Accessing your music server

Once you have Navidrome up and running, you need to create an admin user so that you can manage the server (on the software side). This is because Navidrome allows for multiple users, last.fm scrobbling, etc., and we can configure these directly within Navidrome. The first time you set up Navidrome, it will ask you to create the admin user — it's very important you do this right away!

In your web browser, go to http://127.0.0.1:4533/
Create an admin user — make sure your username and password are secure

Your music server is now set up, and you can start listening to music on it. While listening directly from the browser is possible, there are better options like using dedicated music player apps (also called "clients"). In the following section, I'll talk about how to set up clients on your devices for remote listening.

Note: While it's completely fine to run your server on your personal computer, this can be annoying since you'll need to keep your computer on and connected to the internet at all times in order for the music server itself to stay up. This is why people often set up their servers on a dedicated device (like a NAS, or network storage device) or in the cloud (using a service like PikaPods). I'll cover these in a different post, but this one is just to get you started with the free basics.

Part two: Listening to it on your devices

Now that you've got your server up and running, you might want to connect to it on your other devices, such as your phone.

I. Install Tailscale

First we're going to need a way for devices to connect directly to your computer (and do it in a way that doesn't expose everything!). We'll use a platform called Tailscale to accomplish this.

In your web browser, go to the Tailscale website and create an account (note that you'll be asked to fill out a survey as part of creating an account)
Download Tailscale on the computer that's running your music server
Run Tailscale on your computer and make sure that it's "Connected" after logging in
In the Tailscale Admin Console, make sure that your computer is listed

For each device that you want to use:

On the device you want to use to listen to the music server, install Tailscale — for example, if you want to listen on your phone, you can find Tailscale on the Apple Store or the Google Play Store
Once Tailscale is installed on your listening device, make sure it shows "Connected" in the Tailscale app after logging in
In the Tailscale Admin Console, make sure that your listening device is listed

Additional Steps for Security (click to toggle)

While the above steps are enough to get your devices connected to your music server, we can take some additional steps to add some more security by only allowing devices on Tailscale to listen to your music server.

In the Tailscale Admin Console, go to "Access controls"
Select "Tags" and click on the "Create tag" button
Create a tag called "music-server"
Click on "Create tag" and create a tag called "music-listener"
Go back to "General access rules" and delete the existing rule (currently it is configured so that all devices can connect with all other devices)
Click on "Add rule"
In "Source", choose "tag:music-listener"; in "Destination", choose "tag:music-server"; in "Port and protocol", type in "tcp:4533"
Save the rule!

Now that you’ve set the rule up, you’ll need to add tags to each of your devices. In the Tailscale Admin Console, go to “Machines” in the uppermost tab. For the computer your server is on, click on the three dots on the right and select “Edit ACL tags.” Add “tag:music-server”.

For each of your listening devices, click on the three dots on the right and add “tag:music-listener”. This way, only the devices you’ve tagged can interact with each other, and your listening devices can only connect to your music server.

II. Install a music app (client)

Finally, now that your music server is running, and your devices can connect to it, it's time to install a music app to actually listen to your music!

Just as you could pick between using iTunes or Windows Media Player or VLC to listen to music, there are many different music apps you can choose from, depending on what device you have. There's no right or wrong choice here, it's all subjective based on your preference for what app you prefer to use.

There are really only two steps:

Install the client
Connect it to your Navidrome server

In order to install the client, all you need to do is go to the Apple Store or Google Play Store to get it, if it's an app for your iPhone/Android. Personally, I'm using the following clients to listen to music from my Navidrome server:

Feishin (for Mac/Windows/Linux)
Symfonium or Chora (for Android)
Amperfy (for iPhone/iPad)

You can see a full list of clients to choose from on the Navidrome documentation website.

Even on the computer running the music server, I recommend using a client like Feishin to listen to your music, rather than listening to it directly from the web browser. (Technically you could also just listen to your local files directly, using an app like Swinsian, but this won't sync ratings/favorites/playlists to Navidrome, which you might want to do.)

If you're downloading a music client for your desktop and it's on GitHub, you should go to the "Releases" page and download the latest release version. Windows users should download an .exe, while Mac users should download a .dmg. For example, you can find the Feishin downloads on this page.

Once you've downloaded your music client, you'll need to tell it where your Navidrome server is. Different apps will have different interfaces for this. Go to your Tailscale Admin console (tailscale.com) and write down the IP address of the computer running the music server. This will look something like 100.45.120.67. Use this instead of {yourIPhere} below.

For Amperfy (iPhone/iPad):

Download Amperfy and open it
In the URL field, enter http://{yourIPhere}:4533
Enter the same username and password as the one you made in part one for the admin account

For Chora (Android):

Download Chora and open it
After tapping "Let's go!" tap the "+" button on the bottom right
In the Navidrome URL field, enter http://{yourIPhere}:4533
Enter the same username and password as the one you made in part one for the admin account
Tap "Login" and then tap "Add"

Once you've set that up, give the client a second to load up your music, and you should be able to stream directly from your music server! Happy listening!