Documentation · User Guides · Support

About

Audiobookshelf is a self-hosted audiobook and podcast server.

Features

• Fully open-source, including the android & iOS app (in beta)
• Stream all audio formats on the fly
• Search and add podcasts to download episodes w/ auto-download
• Multi-user support w/ custom permissions
• Keeps progress per user and syncs across devices
• Auto-detects library updates, no need to re-scan
• Upload books and podcasts w/ bulk upload drag and drop folders
• Backup your metadata + automated daily backups
• Progressive Web App (PWA)
• Chromecast support on the web app and android app
• Fetch metadata and cover art from several sources
• Chapter editor and chapter lookup (using Audnexus API)
• Merge your audio files into a single m4b
• Embed metadata and cover image into your audio files
• Basic ebook support and ereader
  • Epub, pdf, cbr, cbz
  • Send ebook to device (i.e. Kindle)
• Open RSS feeds for podcasts and audiobooks

Is there a feature you are looking for? Suggest it

Join us on Discord

Android App (beta)

Try it out on the Google Play Store

iOS App (beta)

Beta is currently full. Apple has a hard limit of 10k beta testers. Updates will be posted in Discord.

Using Test Flight: https://testflight.apple.com/join/wiic7QIW (beta is full)

Build your own tools & clients

Check out the API documentation

Organizing your audiobooks

Directory structure and folder names are important to Audiobookshelf!

See documentation for supported directory structure, folder naming conventions, and audio file metadata usage.

Installation

See install docs

Reverse Proxy Set Up

Important! Audiobookshelf requires a websocket connection.

Note: Subfolder paths (e.g. /audiobooks) are not supported yet. See issue

NGINX Proxy Manager

Toggle websockets support.

NGINX Reverse Proxy

Add this to the site config file on your nginx server after you have changed the relevant parts in the <> brackets, and inserted your certificate paths.

server
{
        listen 443 ssl;
        server_name <sub>.<domain>.<tld>;

        access_log /var/log/nginx/audiobookshelf.access.log;
        error_log /var/log/nginx/audiobookshelf.error.log;

        ssl_certificate      /path/to/certificate;
        ssl_certificate_key  /path/to/key;

        location / {
                     proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For    $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
                     proxy_set_header  X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
                     proxy_set_header  Host              $host;
                     proxy_set_header Upgrade            $http_upgrade;
                     proxy_set_header Connection         "upgrade";

                     proxy_http_version                  1.1;

                     proxy_pass                          http://<URL_to_forward_to>;
                     proxy_redirect                      http:// https://;
                   }
}

Apache Reverse Proxy

Add this to the site config file on your Apache server after you have changed the relevant parts in the <> brackets, and inserted your certificate paths.

For this to work you must enable at least the following mods using a2enmod:

• ssl
• proxy
• proxy_http
• proxy_balancer
• proxy_wstunnel
• rewrite

<IfModule mod_ssl.c>
<VirtualHost *:443>
    ServerName <sub>.<domain>.<tld>

    ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
    CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined

    ProxyPreserveHost On
    ProxyPass / http://localhost:<audiobookshelf_port>/
    RewriteEngine on
    RewriteCond %{HTTP:Upgrade} websocket [NC]
    RewriteCond %{HTTP:Connection} upgrade [NC]
    RewriteRule ^/?(.*) "ws://localhost:<audiobookshelf_port>/$1" [P,L]

    # unless you're doing something special this should be generated by a
    # tool like certbot by let's encrypt
    SSLCertificateFile /path/to/cert/file
    SSLCertificateKeyFile /path/to/key/file
</VirtualHost>
</IfModule>

Some SSL certificates like those signed by Let's Encrypt require ACME validation. To allow Let's Encrypt to write and confirm the ACME challenge, edit your VirtualHost definition to prevent proxying traffic that queries /.well-known and instead serve that directly:

<VirtualHost *:443>
    # ...

    # create the directory structure  /.well-known/acme-challenges
    # within DocumentRoot and give the HTTP user recursive write
    # access to it.
    DocumentRoot /path/to/local/directory

    ProxyPreserveHost On
    ProxyPass /.well-known !
    ProxyPass / http://localhost:<audiobookshelf_port>/

    # ...
</VirtualHost>

SWAG Reverse Proxy

See LinuxServer.io config sample

Synology NAS Reverse Proxy Setup (DSM 7+/Quickconnect)

1. Open Control Panel

   • Navigate to Login Portal > Advanced.

2. General Tab

   • Click Reverse Proxy > Create.

   Setting	Value
   Reverse Proxy Name	audiobookshelf

3. Source Configuration

   Setting	Value
   Protocol	HTTPS
   Hostname	<sub>.<quickconnectdomain>.synology.me
   Port	443
   Access Control Profile	Leave as is

   • Example Hostname: audiobookshelf.mydomain.synology.me

4. Destination Configuration

   Setting	Value
   Protocol	HTTP
   Hostname	Your NAS IP
   Port	13378

5. Custom Header Tab

   • Go to Create > Websocket.
   • Configure Headers (leave as is):

   Header Name	Value
   Upgrade	$http_upgrade
   Connection	$connection_upgrade

6. Advanced Settings Tab

   • Leave as is.

Traefik Reverse Proxy

Middleware relating to CORS will cause the app to report Unknown Error when logging in. To prevent this don't apply any of the following headers to the router for this site:

• accessControlAllowMethods
• accessControlAllowOriginList
• accessControlMaxAge

From @Dondochaka and @BeastleeUK

Example Caddyfile - Caddy Reverse Proxy

subdomain.domain.com {
        encode gzip zstd
        reverse_proxy <LOCAL_IP>:<PORT>
}

HAProxy

Below is a generic HAProxy config, using audiobookshelf.YOUR_DOMAIN.COM.

To use http2, ssl is needed.

global
    # ... (your global settings go here)

defaults
    mode http
    # ... (your default settings go here)

frontend my_frontend
    # Bind to port 443, enable SSL, and specify the certificate list file
    bind :443 name :443 ssl crt-list /path/to/cert.crt_list alpn h2,http/1.1
    mode http

    # Define an ACL for subdomains starting with "audiobookshelf"
    acl is_audiobookshelf hdr_beg(host) -i audiobookshelf

    # Use the ACL to route traffic to audiobookshelf_backend if the condition is met,
    # otherwise, use the default_backend
    use_backend audiobookshelf_backend if is_audiobookshelf
    default_backend default_backend

backend audiobookshelf_backend
    mode http
    # ... (backend settings for audiobookshelf go here)

    # Define the server for the audiobookshelf backend
    server audiobookshelf_server 127.0.0.99:13378

backend default_backend
    mode http
    # ... (default backend settings go here)

    # Define the server for the default backend
    server default_server 127.0.0.123:8081

pfSense and HAProxy

For pfSense the inputs are graphical, and Health checking is enabled.

Frontend, Default backend, access control lists and actions

Access Control lists

Name	Expression	CS	Not	Value
audiobookshelf	Host starts with:			audiobookshelf.

Actions

The condition acl names needs to match the name above audiobookshelf.

Action	Parameters	Condition acl names
Use Backend	audiobookshelf	audiobookshelf

Backend

The Name needs to match the Parameters above audiobookshelf.

Name	audiobookshelf

Server list:

Name	Expression	CS	Not	Value
audiobookshelf	Host starts with:			audiobookshelf.

Health checking:

Health checking is enabled by default. Http check method of OPTIONS is not supported on Audiobookshelf. If Health check fails, data will not be forwared. Need to do one of following:

• To disable: Change Health check method to none.
• To make Health checking function: Change Http check method to HEAD or GET.

Run from source

Contributing

This application is built using NodeJs.

Localization

Thank you to Weblate for hosting our localization infrastructure pro-bono. If you want to see Audiobookshelf in your language, please help us localize. Additional information on helping with the translations here.

Dev Container Setup

The easiest way to begin developing this project is to use a dev container. An introduction to dev containers in VSCode can be found here.

Required Software:

• Docker Desktop
• VSCode

Note, it is possible to use other container software than Docker and IDEs other than VSCode. However, this setup is more complicated and not covered here.

Install the required software on Windows with winget

Note: This requires a PowerShell prompt with winget installed. You should be able to copy and paste the code block to install. If you use an elevated PowerShell prompt, UAC will not pop up during the installs.

winget install -e --id Docker.DockerDesktop; `
winget install -e --id Microsoft.VisualStudioCode

Install the required software on MacOS with homebrew

brew install --cask docker visual-studio-code

Install the required software on Linux with snap

sudo snap install docker; \
sudo snap install code --classic

After installing these packages, you can now install the Remote Development extension for VSCode. After installing this extension open the command pallet (ctrl+shift+p or cmd+shift+p) and select the command >Dev Containers: Rebuild and Reopen in Container. This will cause the development environment container to be built and launched.

You are now ready to start development!

Manual Environment Setup

If you don't want to use the dev container, you can still develop this project. First, you will need to install NodeJs (version 20) and FFmpeg.

Next you will need to create a dev.js file in the project's root directory. This contains configuration information and paths unique to your development environment. You can find an example of this file in .devcontainer/dev.js.

You are now ready to build the client:

npm ci
cd client
npm ci
npm run generate
cd ..

Development Commands

After setting up your development environment, either using the dev container or using your own custom environment, the following commands will help you run the server and client.

To run the server, you can use the command npm run dev. This will use the client that was built when you ran npm run generate in the client directory or when you started the dev container. If you make changes to the server, you will need to restart the server. If you make changes to the client, you will need to run the command (cd client; npm run generate) and then restart the server. By default the client runs at localhost:3333, though the port can be configured in dev.js.

You can also build a version of the client that supports live reloading. To do this, start the server, then run the command (cd client; npm run dev). This will run a separate instance of the client at localhost:3000 that will be automatically updated as you make changes to the client.

If you are using VSCode, this project includes a couple of pre-defined targets to speed up this process. First, if you build the project (ctrl+shift+b or cmd+shift+b) it will automatically generate the client. Next, there are debug commands for running the server and client. You can view these targets using the debug panel (bring it up with (ctrl+shift+d or cmd+shift+d):

• Debug server—Run the server.
• Debug client (nuxt)—Run the client with live reload.
• Debug server and client (nuxt)—Runs both the preceding two debug targets.

How to Support

See the incomplete "How to Support" page