The entire feel of the app is a beta product. It works as long as you do everything exactly how the developers envisioned you to use it. I feel like I have to force close the app to make sure it works, even basic stuff like just walking away from my home will cause the app to become entirely non-responsive (stop preferring IPv4 locally if you want that to stop devs). Videos should not play if the subtitles haven’t been loaded (how am I supposed to understand what is being played?). I have WiFi 6E, my “auto” bitrate should not be 1.5mbps even though I can pull 1.6gbps over WiFi (even remotely, I have fiber), I’ve even set my “internet” bandwidth to the maximum possible. Compared to plex? 8/10, it’s most of the way there. Compared to Netflix? 4/10, I still get random “Playback errors” on my iPhone 15 Pro Max for incredibly basic H.264 streams that work fine on everything else.
Great looking App but has issues and is not for pc novices
Pros- App is gorgeous both on iPhone and on home PC. It really is like having your own Netflix etc. It manages to pull images and info with ease and combines it into a lovely user friendly package that I use daily. Cons - iPhone app struggles at time to stay connected to Chromecast and the app’s ‘remote control’ function regularly fails to connect stopping the using from all forms of program control (skipping, pausing etc). Constant restarts needed over and over again. Don’t get this app if you your primary usage will be for music as it you will be very dissatisfied. It can’t manage music at all. Grouping, search and almost all features you get from programs like iTunes or any other similar products are missing or do not work. It’s simply bad. Connecting outside of your local network is very difficult and to date after many help articles, lots of reading and many attempts I have still been unable to get it to work. It’s a shame because it would be great to be able to use it away from home and would encourage me to recommend it to friends and family. I’m quite experienced with building pc’s, setting up home and office networks etc so for the average computer user I would foresee this being a very difficult solution to implement properly. Devs - Please keep up the improvements as I would love the above issues be resolved before another suitable solution comes along. Good luck!
I host my own media server and got fed up with Plex requiring registration of my server with my online account because my server wasn't showing up. Enter Emby Media Server! Easy to install, and no requirement to register anything in order to access my media locally. HOWEVER... You cannot watch your hosted media on iOS without being forced to purchase. I understand devs need to eat, and the devs have done great work with Emby, but if users can't watch their own media on their own server in their own home without having to purchase a feature, then make the app $4.99 to download. Making it a free download and then requiring a purchase to use is borderline bait-and-switch in my book. Premiere service should unlock extra features and extra media available online through my account that I don't already own-- I would be willing to spend money on that. Premiere should not be required for basic functionality. That one flaw dropped my rating from 5 stars to 3. Still prefer Emby over Plex, but instead of paying for extra content I'm now deleting this app.
Like many many others, I am using Emby because Plex drove me away with their greedy rent seeking behavior (and their borderline illegal pushing into streaming and sharing media, instead of staying comfortably in their lane of a media server for format shifted content I own). However, even if Plex stopped their rent seeking behavior I still wouldn’t go back. emby is awesome. What you get, out of the box, for free, is amazing! It is almost zero maintenance and it works flawlessly. I was happy to kick them $99 for a lifetime premiere license, oth as a thank you for such a great product, and also to support their wonderful development efforts. With Emby being hosted on my media server, I have zero incentive to look for an alternative setup. Great job Emby team! (Now please update the Apple TV client app to have feature parity with the Roku client🙏🥺)
1. You aren’t going to be able to use this app until you pay. Plex’s app works in a very similar manner. It is nice that both of them will let you download and look at the layout before getting into actual purchase time. 2. Emby will give you a couple of purchase options just like Plex does. Monthly/lifetime etc. 3. If you want everything to be free your only real option is Jellyfin. Realize that due to this Jellyfin is behind Plex and Emby (you get what you pay for) As for this app in general, get connected to your server, test out whether you like Emby on a streaming device like Roku (all of this can be done for free). If you like that and want to add premium devices (like this app) feel free to download the app, look at how the media is organized, and make your purchasing decision. The negative... -I do wish this app would let me play a minute of content before telling me I need premium. That is one thing I liked more when testing out Plex before buying lifetime. (Edit) it does give you a minute of playing media without paying. Click the movie and when the pay wall jumps on screen, scroll down and click “play one minute”
Currently when watching a lot of different media, the notch or Dynamic Island will cover up the content being watched. This bug was first reported on the Emby Forums in July 2018 and has still yet to be fixed. The last update was in December 2023 where someone from the team said they are looking into it. This is really something that should’ve been fixed since the iPhone X came out. Absolutely no reason for it to be taking this long, especially when having to pay either an Emby Premiere license or pay just to use this client. Other things like needing to force close the app constantly to get things to work among other annoyances. Stay clear of Emby. Your options are either Plex, which has its issues but at least the clients are nice, and Jellyfin, which is literally Emby except free and honestly the clients are about the same. I just feel like I’m being robbed with Emby.
This is the Emby app for iOS, it gets 5/5 stars because it has worked flawlessly for 3 years and hasn’t had any issues to date that I can remember. If you don’t have a server license subscription or one time server license purchase, then you have to purchase the Emby iOS app to access your own server. The server license is the way to go, then all Emby clients across all platforms and any additional users can all use the Emby app for free. This is a review of the Emby app for iOS, not the Emby server you connect to. Emby for iOS works pretty flawlessly and I’ve never had an issue with it. From watching content to using the admin features to add a user or change access it all works as intended. It is regularity updated, and if an issue does happen, reports in the Emby forums start coming in and the DEVS are pretty much on top of it. I have to say the DEVS and forums staff really care about Emby and try and answer every question if they can. The Emby Server is not a flawless product. But the Emby app for iOS gets 5/5 stars.
To the Emby Team: Thank you. This is a truly amazing application. I tried Plex but was dissatisfied with the lack of customization and the requirement of a cloud account. Emby has solved my media streaming needs! HDHomeRun support is great, the metadata grabbing is superb, and the transcoding was simple to set up and works well. There are some bugs here and there—but I know full and well the devs are doing what they can to fix everything. I have one feature request, I suppose I need to post on the forum! Regardless, I love this piece of software. It has definitely been worth the $129 for the lifetime subscription! I’m in it for the long haul :)
I agree Plex has more features and looks better. This being said, Plex has far more bugs and security risks. Unnecessary features make Plex hard to navigate and support. Emby has full reverse proxy support with SSL. Not sure what all the bad reviews are for. Emby is far more robust and plays flawlessly on all supported clients. No talking back to mothership-like servers for user authentication. When Plex API servers go out, which they do about once a month, you can’t access the server remotely which defeats the purpose of plex pass. I am running both and Emby is far superior. Don’t let aesthetics fool you into going with Plex!
What the heck. 1st off i purchased this app for my iphone. Secondly, I purchased the premium subscription. But now i go to play a movie while offline and get msg that i need to purchase to “unlock features” I get that you guys are trying to pay bills, but gees! Isn’t there something you can put in to deactivate this? Works on everything but the iPhone (iphone is only place I’m seeing this message). Maybe it’s an Apple thing? In any case. Why have this in the app, if you have to purchase or pay to use the server?? It makes no sense guys.
I’ve been a Plex Lifetime Subscriber for a couple years now and while I had heard about Emby, I never really paid much attention to it. Out of boredom, I decided to try it a few days ago and I’m soo glad that I did. Soo happy in fact that I purchased a Lifetime license and I’m officially migrating from Plex. Emby’s interface is much better than Plex. I love the customization options and it works much better. While Plex syncs instead of straight up downloading, Emby downloads and stream media on the app much better and faster than Plex does. Keep up the great work devs.
Works smoothly and haven’t had any major issues, the only minor issues I’ve had with it is that when i press the home button it switches servers when all i wanted to do was go home of the current server I’m on. And the other trouble i have is that on occasion the play/pause control of lock screen wont work with Emby and pause/play. There issues which i don’t have a problem living with but it would be nice to see them fixed. But other than that it works very nice
I’m running a Plex server was checking for an alternative. Installed the Emby Docker, added the music folder and let it scan. Downloaded the Emby iOS app and .... well, you’d think that the index on the right would allow you to quickly scroll to an album or artist, but fat luck with that. It’s only there for decoration, apparently. Lame! I understand that they need to make money somehow, but the ‘free’ version doesn’t even let you stream music. For now, this isn’t a particularly attractive alternative to Plex. It’s as expensive and doesn’t have the features that Plex has, or the user base. Developers, cut the lifetime cost in half and we can talk; also fix the iOS bugs. Thanks
Updating server will delete your data and account making the user lose its settings. Instead, it makes it difficult to re-add the files than it did before. This is Linux. It also doesn’t let you use emby connect account and password. Downloading the update and trying to install won’t help. It tries to install the previous update it had before. I tried following the link.
Moving to Emby from another media ecosystem that has traditionally struggled with offline viewing as well, I lept at an Emby Premiere Black Friday lifetime subscription. Took the time to make sure I had some downloads set up, didn’t even bother transcoding and just chose original quality. Turned on airplane mode while at home yesterday to test and? Voila! Fast-forward to 10,000ft and rising east of Denver this morning. With *everything* but BT turned off, Downloads simply will not even load. Several restarts of the app, a reboot of my phone, etc. At one point I could only get a black screen with a back arrow at the top. Pressing on the Downloads folder icon would *sometimes* bring up a spinning circle? But mostly nothing would happen. Those files are on my phone. ~12gig of ‘em. Consider offline access to your media 100% work in progress, and Premiere not fully valuable until then. - mike
First of all, I have to thank Luke for his timely response to all the issues on forum. I tried Plex and Emby, loved the Emby interface. I love the fact that I can customize my home screen and the 4k content playback is smooth, this app deserves 5 stas. I just purchased the lifetime membership and I wish there were referral bonus because I referred 3 of my friends and they love it too :-) Keep up the great work!!
I used to be able to cast a video to my TV with Chromecast which turns the phone into a remote, with video playback controls on the Lock Screen and volume control through the phone’s buttons. This was such a great feature, why was it removed? Now when I use Chromecast, I constantly have to reconnect to my tv every time I leave and return to the emby app on my phone. It’s a really frustrating user experience.
Emby is great. The only two things I dont like are: 1) you have to subscribe to download your own content on the app, but if you open the the server in safari which functions almost identically to the app it’s free. Kinda strange. 2) There is no PiP function in the app, but this feature is also available when it’s opened in safari. Overall emby is a great and I use it all the time.
On local network is slow! Takes 15 min to load library while infuse does that instantly. On local network even though I have emby premiere on my server still asks for license. Probably because the server is not on the internet. The ellow icon is active! Useless premium!
Emby has potential but the Apple TV app is just hot garbage right now. I’m surprised with the amount of Apple users in the world that Apple TV has such little love. Playlist do not work. Favorites while they work only show some of the favorites. There’s no show more or expand option like there is on the iOS app. I literally have to search for my shows every time because I can’t see them in my favorites. It’s really annoying and if my IPTV provider didn’t require this app I’d definitely move to another app in a heartbeat. Pitiful app for Apple TV.
I’ve been using Emby Premium for a little over a week now, and everything is working extremely well. The issues I had with Plex for files straight up not appearing in the library (the library is hosted on a FreeNAS SMB share) isn’t an issue with Emby - everything is present as it should be. Emby hasn’t had any trouble with 4K HDR (Dolby Vision) MKV files either. Recommended!
Had an issue not getting a channel (noticed only after a day of signing up/ only channel I watch) emailed them asking if they could fix it, they got back to me the next day and said it was fixed........ well the problem was not fixed so emailed them again letting them know that the issue was still there. They got back to me saying “this is not at&t, we don’t have to deal with you” and canceled my account........ well okay then all I wanted was the issue fixed. I was not rude at all, so if you ever have a problem they probably will not help and just cancel you....
Emby for iOS is able to handle 99 percent of the media files I throw at it. Only thing missing is integrated support for comic books CBZ and PDF reader so I can use it to read my collection of graphic novels and magazine. A music visualizer plugin or screensaver would also be nice in order to have something to look at while listening to music.
In general the app is great, but I recently upgraded to the iPhone X, and the are some glaring shortcomings. When playing a video the home bar is persistent. This didn't happen when using Emby through Safari. Also when playing a video, the controls at the bottom are partially cut off, making them more difficult to access. Please fix this!
Oh my god, we’ve been waiting for you to fix your product since you broke everything with your November update. Only took you 5-6 months to get around to it, huh? Better late than never, I suppose. I docked you a star for being lazy. Next time you break emby, please get off your duff and fix it a little faster. K?
On the iPad, this is by far the best looking Emby app out there. The layout is even better than the PC look and a million times better than what it looks like or functions on Kodi. The only thing that would make this app absolutely perfect would be the ability to launch a movie on any Kodi client on my network (PC, Mac, or Shield). Now with that I would pay for a lifetime license.
Why does it not allow me to have The right art work when the title correct and also have a option to never scan folders because if it’s complete then it’s scanning for no reason like for example if you have no more movies in your collection or if it’s a complete series etc thanks for providing this program
It works well. My only two complaints at the moment are 1) there’s a bug where very often the app opens to a black screen and I have to swipe it away and reopen it and 2) downloads should show that they’re in progress when the server is converting them.
Running on unraid server with gpu transcoding for more than a month and everything is great so far. Sharing it with few coworkers and they enjoy my media collection. Once infinite scroll and movie counter is implemented it'll be perrect. Might not be the best UI but does the job. I'm sure it will be improved.
When I open a video on EMBY it says “unlock this feature unlock this feature with a small one time purchase(at 4.99) or with an active Emby premiere account(at 6.99$).” .I don’t understand what it mean ,”unlock this feature wiith a small one time purchase(at 4.99)”1.Does it allow to play all video in emby for a month or all lifetime at 4.99$.2. Or it means it play only this one video at 4.99$ . 3. I don’t want monthly Emby subscription,I need lifetime access. Does Emby have a lifetime subscription ?what its cost?
If you have an iOS/iPadOS/FireTV device, use JellyFish.. the apps are nearly impossible to use without having to have to pay for a one time fee $5(ish). So personally what I did to bypass this scam. If I also set up JellyFish on my PC so I have Emby and JellyFish server running, JellyFish for any place where it has you purchase... I can now get it free without needing to. Other than that Emby is great. I have Emby for my 5 Roku TV’s and they’re doing great. No issues with those.
Recent changes to Plex (“free” streaming stuff that buries your actual library) had me seek an alternative and I landed on Emby. Holy cow, I had no idea there was such an amazing option out there! Emby is WAY easier, more customizable, robust, and just a freaking pleasure to use.
I am not happy with my Emby experience. I moved from Plex because whenever I run the Plex server it disconnects the internet on my PC and Plex unable to fix it. So moved to Emby. First of all getting it set up to access remote from different network is too hard and can’t get that to work. So I downloaded movies and shows to my iPad and the update has made them unavailable!! So far this app does not work for me. Support is absent.
For anyone looking for the missing restore purchases button and u don’t have emby premiere...I found out that by turning on in app purchases if u have it turned off revealed the button I was looking for. In IOS 12 restrictions its moved under screen time... took me awhile to find that too 😒
Been using it for 8 years. Like it better than Plex
Cool interface. Lots of options and flexibility. They continue to update it. Free. Plex just feels overly greedy and bloated compared to this at thus point. Keep up the good work.
It’s a good app overall, and everything performs well. Only complaint is the lack of picture-in-picture support for iPadOS. You can make that work if you skip the app and use Safari instead, but that’s not as convenient as launching a native app.
I can't speak the IT language, but the only thing Emby has compared to other media is its superior selection of content. It's glitchy, slow to load, and unavailable to me in certain areas of the country. Sometimes the subtitles are absolutely worthless, if they are available at all. I have a love/ hate relationship with Emby.
When the app is working it’s terrific. Unfortunately, it generally works for a day or two and then it freezes up. I had hoped that the recent update would help, but it still has the same problem. The only solution is to remove the app and re-download again. Not very convenient to do this every couple of days. Anyone know a fix for this?
Emby is so badly coded that it’s astonishing they charge money for it. I installed it on port 9086 and it worked fine for about an hour. Then through some sort of witchcraft, it decided to start listening on 8086 even though I never told it to. Completely broke the install. There are also UI bugs on every TV I tried it on. Blank gray bars, Ui elements that stay on screen during playback, etc. Stay away.
The idea that iOS devices have to pay to access the server that's in my local network is redicilous. I understand that if I wanted to use the service over the internet I'd need to pay but to access the server via the local network is just stupid levels of greed. Off to iunnstall this from the server and reconfigure the server to use jellyfin. Waste of my time...
I would give this a negative 5 star if I can. It doesn’t have Picture in Picture and it doesn’t support external monitor. I have to constantly re-open this app to keep watching the video after something like reply a message, turn on the lights, etc. It just closed if I’m trying to do something else. And the video just stops playing if I connect to an external monitor.
Please add gesture shortcuts for toggling between Fit and Fullscreen mode while playing a video, because it’s not convenient to click the setting icon to choose between different modes. Thanks!
Should have read description. Can’t use without paying money!
I was really hoping this would save me the trouble of loading a bunch of songs on my phone. Had I read the description I would have never installed this. You cannot use this app for anything useful without paying money to unlock it. Useful things like playing music and what not. It would be nice to make people pay for usage when not on your own local network, but when your on your own local network connecting to your own local emby server, it would be nice to be able to use it free. Thanks for a nice looking app, but no thanks.
Playing directly without transcoding is awesome. But the downside is playing offline get error “no compatible streaming“ it says,I hope this will fix on the next update. One last thing, the downloading percentage is better to be visible on notification panel.
Refuses to connect to a server I can see is running and which other non-iOS devices can connect to and stream from. Did all the troubleshooting. Nada. Slow, every screen loads forever, even just pressing the “back” button to exit from the account menu back to main page works only about 25% of the time. Absolutely trash app.
Updates are not good. With every one of them they break something. Latest update is the final straw as it broke login passwords. Not one person can login, doesn’t matter if they are an administrator or regular user. So now it’s back to Plex only because that doesn’t lock everyone out!!! Fire your programming staff and get people who actually do quality work!
I was simply looking for some way to manage my many media items. What I got was fantastic. All I had was filenames. Now I have my own personal Netf**x.
My primary issue is if you pay for the app to stream locally, it still annoys you with the emby sub advert. The app also rarely reconnects when I leave my wifi network and then later rejoin. To be clear to the devs, if I’m buying any sub I’m going to switch to plex which is much more polished. You already got some support money from me, quit harassing me or you might find some truly free competition coming your way...
Half the time (not an exaggeration) it just doesn't work. Chromecast streaming is just plain broken. I have two Chromecast devices, both work fine with every other app. But even trying to simply play back content that is downloaded and on my device, it just hangs and never plays. And I paid for this.
Bringing all of your personal media together into one place has never been easier! Emby unites your personal videos, music, and photos and streams them to your devices. Get the free Emby Media Server from the Emby website (required as part of your Emby install). • Emby automatically converts your media on-the-fly to play on any device. • Emby organizes your media into an elegant display with artwork, rich metadata and related content. • Easily share your media with friends and family. • Rich parental control and management features allow you to easily control access for your entire family. • Stream your cloud-synced media (with installed cloud sync providers) The app is free to browse your media collection, and free to cast media to other devices. Playback requires a small one-time in-app purchase, or an active Emby Premiere subscription, also available in-app. Emby Premiere is available in-app as a monthly subscription for $6.99 USD per month. Payment will be charged to your iTunes Account upon confirmation of purchase. The subscription automatically renews unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24-hours before the end of the current period. Your account will be charged for renewal within 24-hours prior to the end of the current period, and the renewal cost is $6.99 USD. Subscriptions may be managed and auto-renewal may be turned off by going to your Account Settings after purchase. No cancellation of the current subscription is allowed during the active subscription period. Our privacy policy can be found at https://emby.media/privacy. Please also see our terms of use at https://emby.media/terms. All content displayed here is licensed for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license. The videos displayed are available on the Open Movie Project, found at http://www.blender.org/
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