[opensourcedex]

ansible-nas is a free, open source media & streaming project written in Jinja and released under MIT. It has 3,780 GitHub stars, 513 forks and 102 open issues, and was last pushed 7 months ago. On this registry it ranks #9 of 27 tracked projects in Media & Streaming, with 5 head-to-head comparisons available. It gained 1 stars over the last 3 tracked days.

What is ansible-nas?

What it is

Ansible-NAS is an open-source Ansible playbook for building a home server or network-attached storage replacement on a stock Ubuntu system. It lives in the self-hosted homelab ecosystem, where users combine Ansible automation, Docker containers, and Ubuntu Server to run personal services on hardware they own.

The project addresses the problem of replacing a packaged NAS appliance or a fragile server setup with a reproducible playbook. Its author describes moving away from broken FreeNAS updates by using Ubuntu, Ansible configuration, and Docker containers instead. The playbook lets an operator select and configure applications for media, files, backups, home automation, development tools, and remote access, rather than depending on a vendor appliance or manually installing each container.

Key capabilities

  • It can configure any or all listed applications on a home server through Ansible roles.
  • It supports Docker-based media services such as Airsonic, Emby, and Booksonic for music, video, and audiobook cataloging and streaming.
  • It includes e-book and file management tools such as Calibre, Calibre-web, and Cloud Commander.
  • It provides backup and download tooling through Duplicacy, Duplicati, Deluge, and CouchPotato.
  • It can expose services outside the home LAN when a spare domain name is available, assigning sensible hostnames and updating DNS when the home IP changes.
  • It includes home automation and infrastructure helpers such as ESPHome, Apcupsd, Cloudflare DDNS, DDNS Updater, and Drone CI.
  • It supports self-hosted web tools such as Vaultwarden, Gitea, DokuWiki, Fresh RSS, Firefly III, Code Server, and Dashy.

Who uses it and how

  • Homelab users replace a dedicated NAS box by deploying a general-purpose Ubuntu server and selecting the applications they need.
  • Media collectors use it to run streaming, cataloging, subtitle, and download tools together on one machine.
  • Developers and self-hosters use it to provision browser-accessible tools such as Code Server, Gitea, Drone CI, and Dashy.
  • Users with a domain name use it to make selected services reachable from outside the home network through dynamic DNS and hostname configuration.
  • Operators who prefer reproducible infrastructure use Ansible to manage many Docker containers from one playbook instead of configuring each container manually.

Getting started

The README describes using a stock Ubuntu install with Ansible and Docker containers; the playbook is then run to configure selected applications.

When to use it — and when not to

Use it when you want a self-managed home server built from Ubuntu, Ansible, and Docker, and you are comfortable choosing and operating individual applications. Avoid it when you need a packaged NAS appliance with a vendor-supported interface, because the playbook gives many application choices but still requires the operator to maintain the host, storage, networking, and container updates. The project's breadth and 102 open issues suggest that configuration decisions and ongoing maintenance remain the user's responsibility.

project readme (upstream, from github) — read inline

Ansible NAS

Available Applications CI Integration Gitter chat license Ko-fi

After getting burned by broken FreeNAS updates one too many times, I figured I could do a much better job myself using just a stock Ubuntu install, some clever Ansible config and a bunch of Docker containers.

What Ansible-NAS Does

You can configure Ansible-NAS to set up any (or all!) of the applications listed below on your home server.

If you have a spare domain name you can configure applications to be accessible externally to your home LAN too; they'll be configured with a sensible hostname and DNS gets updated accordingly if your home IP address changes.

Available Applications

  • Airsonic - catalog and stream music
  • Apcupsd - A daemon for controlling APC UPSes
  • Bazarr - companion to Radarr and Sonarr for downloading subtitles
  • Bitwarden - Password Manger (Technically Vaultwarden, a lightweight implementation in Rust)
  • Booksonic - The selfhosted audiobook server
  • Calibre - Calibre is a powerful and easy to use e-book manager.
  • Calibre-web - Provides a clean interface for browsing, reading and downloading eBooks using an existing Calibre database.
  • Code Server - Powerful IDE from Microsoft accessible through the browser
  • Cloud Commander - A dual panel file manager with integrated web console and text editor
  • Cloudflare DDNS - automatically update Cloudflare with your IP address
  • CouchPotato - for downloading and managing movies
  • Dashy - A self-hosted startpage for your server. Easy to use visual editor, status checking, widgets, themes and tons more!
  • DDNS Updater - dynamic dns updater for serveral providers
  • Deluge - A lightweight, Free Software, cross-platform BitTorrent client.
  • DokuWiki - A simple to use and highly versatile Open Source wiki software that doesn't require a database.
  • Drone CI - A self-service Continuous Integration platform for busy development teams.
  • Duplicacy - A web UI for the Duplicacy cloud backup program, which provides lock-free deduplication backups to multiple providers
  • Duplicati - for backing up your stuff
  • Emby - Media streaming and management
  • ESPHome - ESP8266/ESP32 programming and management for home automation
  • Firefly III - Free and open source personal finance manager
  • FlareSolverr - FlareSolverr is a proxy server to bypass Cloudflare and DDoS-GUARD protection
  • Fresh RSS - Self-hosted RSS feed aggregator like Leed or Kriss Feed
  • get_iplayer - download programmes from BBC iplayer
  • Gitea - Simple self-hosted GitHub clone
  • GitLab - Self-hosted GitHub clone of the highest order
  • Glances - for seeing the state of your system via a web browser
  • Gotify - Self-hosted server for sending push notifications
  • Grafana - Query, visualize, alert on, and understand your data no matter where it’s stored (via stats role).
  • Guacamole - Web based remote desktop gateway, supports VNC, RDP and SSH
  • Homepage - Highly customizable application dashboard with integrations for over 100 services.
  • healthchecks.io - Ensure your NAS is online and get notified otherwise
  • Heimdall - Home server dashboard
  • Home Assistant - Open source home automation
  • Homebridge - Emulate the iOS HomeKit API
  • iSpy Agent DVR - iSpy - Agent DVR is a video surveillance software
  • Jackett - API Support for your favorite torrent trackers
  • Jellyfin - The Free Software Media System
  • Joomla - Open source content management system
  • Komga - a media server for your comics, mangas, BDs and magazines
  • Krusader - Twin panel file management for your desktop
  • Lidarr - Music collection manager for Usenet and BitTorrent users
  • Loki - Loki is a horizontally scalable, highly available, multi-tenant log aggregation system inspired by Prometheus.
  • Mealie - A self-hosted recipe manager and meal planner
  • Minecraft Java Server - Java server edition of the popular building and exploring game
  • Minecraft Bedrock Server - Bedrock server edition of the popular building and exploring game
  • MiniDLNA - simple media server which is fully compliant with DLNA/UPnP-AV clients
  • Miniflux - An RSS news reader
  • Minio - MinIO is a high-performance, S3 compatible object store
  • Mosquitto - An open source MQTT broker
  • Mumble - Open source, low latency, high quality voice chat
  • Mylar - An automated Comic Book downloader (cbr/cbz) for use with SABnzbd, NZBGet and torrents
  • MyMediaForAlexa - Lets you stream your music collection to your alexa device
  • n8n - Nodemation, a node based workflow and automation service like IFTTT.
  • navidrome - Modern Music Server and Streamer compatible with Subsonic/Airsonic
  • netboot.xyz - a PXE boot server
  • Netdata - An extremely comprehensive system monitoring solution
  • Nextcloud - A self-hosted Dropbox alternative
  • Nomad - A simple and flexible scheduler and software orchestrator
  • NZBget - The most efficient usenet downloader
  • Octoprint - Control and monitor your 3D printer
  • Ombi - web application that automatically gives your users the ability to request content
  • openHAB - A vendor and technology agnostic open source automation software for your home
  • Organizr - ORGANIZR aims to be your one stop shop for your Servers Frontend.
  • overseerr - open source software application for managing requests for your media library
  • Paperless_ng - Scan, index and archive all your physical documents
  • Piwigo - Photo Gallery Software
  • Plex - Plex Media Server
  • Portainer - for managing Docker and running custom images
  • Prometheus - Time series database and monitoring system (via stats role).
  • Promtail - Promtail is an agent which ships the contents of local logs to a private Grafana Loki instance
  • Prowlarr - Indexer aggregator for Sonarr, Radarr, Lidarr, etc.
  • pyLoad - A download manager with a friendly web-interface
  • PyTivo - An HMO and GoBack server for TiVos.
  • Radarr - for organisin

readme truncated — read the full docs on github

Frequently asked questions

Is ansible-nas free to use?

ansible-nas is open source under the MIT licence. There is no licence fee and no seat count — you can self-host it or, where the project offers one, pay a vendor for a managed version instead.

What does ansible-nas do?

Build a full-featured home server or NAS replacement with an Ubuntu box and this playbook.

What is ansible-nas written in?

ansible-nas is primarily written in Jinja. Its source is publicly available at https://github.com/davestephens/ansible-nas, and it has 3,780 GitHub stars.