A free software to take back control of your videos! With more than 100 000 hosted videos, viewed more than 6 millions times and 20 000 users, PeerTube is the decentralized free software alternative to videos platforms developed by Framasoft
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Website developed by <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framasoft.org">Framasoft</a> and designed by <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.maiwann.net/">Maiwann</a>
Illustrations from <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framatube.org/videos/watch/9c9de5e8-0a1e-484a-b099-e80766180a6d">What is PeerTube video</a>, created by <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://libreart.info/">LILA</a> - <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://film.zemarmot.net/">ZeMarmot Team</a>
PeerTube mascot created by <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.davidrevoy.com/">David Revoy</a>
<em>PeerTube news!</em> content licensed under <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">CC-BY-SA</a>
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Why progressive fundraising over 6 months?
At a time when no one knows what the future holds, we deem it inappropriate to start a crowdfunding campaign and threaten not to do our best on PeerTube if we don't get the necessary funds.
We believe in the public utility of PeerTube, so much so that we commit to working on it for six months to make this v3 happen, even if we must do it with our own funds (which <a href="https://framablog.org/2019/11/12/peertube-has-worked-twice-as-hard-to-free-your-videos-from-youtube/">we had already done for v2</a>).
We still hope that by sharing this roadmap as widely as possible, some of you will support us in our approach with a donation that will allow us to fund this project.
Global search
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Moderation tools
Plugins & Playlists
Live streaming
<p>Today, when searching for videos on a PeerTube instance, it is hard to
<strong>find content that is not in the federation bubble</strong> of that instance.</p>
<p>We will create a <strong>server that indexes all videos</strong>
and channels from all PeerTube instances that are listed on
<a href="https://instances.joinpeertube.org/">the public directory</a>.
The code for this indexing engine will be open source,
so that anyone can host their own by setting their own eligibility rules.</p>
<p>Each PeerTube instance administrator will be able to choose to <strong>
use one of these indexing engines for their instance's search bar</strong>.</p>
<p>In addition, <strong>announcements</strong>
will allow instance administrators to display information to visitors.</p>
<p>While each new version of PeerTube has brought <a
href="https://joinpeertube.org/faq#peertube-developers-did-not-add-moderation-tools">new moderation features</a>,
there is still much to be done to <strong>facilitate moderation</strong> of content and accounts within the fediverse.
That's why we want to <strong>dedicate a month to the development of new moderation tools</strong>.</p>
<p>The list of features we have to develop or improve is long: reports logs and monitoring, moderation history,
comments moderation, moderation reports related to an account, feedback on steps taken (or not) following a report,
<strong>fight against spam</strong>, sharing blocklists of instances, accounts or content...</p>
<p>This list is being built
<a href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/labels/Component%3A%20Moderation%20%3Agodmode%3A"><strong>in collaboration with the community</strong></a>,
and it is with these needs in mind that we will try to prioritize the moderation tools developed during this month.</p>
<p>While it is easy to embed a PeerTube video on a website or social media, the same cannot be said for playlists.
We want to rework the <strong>embed and display of playlists</strong> on third party websites.</p>
<p>We also want to <strong>allow two clips of the same video to be displayed in a playlist</strong>. Combined with the ability to
extract a specific piece of video in a playlist, <strong>playlists will thus become very useful remixing tools</strong>,
for example for educational purposes.</p>
<p>Plugins allow anyone to contribute to new PeerTube features by coding them into PeerTube, and offer them to instance
administrators. We want to <strong>improve the plugin system</strong> to offer more interaction possibilities.</p>
<p>In order to put ourselves in their contributors' shoes, we are going to create a few plugins of our own,
for example one to <strong>display information over a video to annotate it</strong> at a specific point in the viewing process.</p>
<p>Finally, we want to work on <strong>selecting a set of plugins to showcase</strong> them on joinpeertube.org.</p>
<p>The biggest challenge of live streaming on PeerTube is to <strong>get the live stream to be peer-to-peer</strong>.
After extensive testing, we believe this is possible.</p>
<p>By using the HLS technology that has been built into the PeerTube video player since version 1.3, we believe
we can <strong>create a live stream with one minute of lag between streamers and viewers</strong>.</p>
<p>We want to lay the technological foundation for this live stream feature, so <strong>this first version of
PeerTube Live will be minimalist</strong>. There will be no stream captation tools, no built-in chat, no react emojis...</p>
<p>However, we want to make sure that <strong>once the live stream is over, the video will be processed and
added to the creator's channel</strong>, with every requirement for proper federation checked.</p>
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Who are we?
<strong>Framasoft</strong> (that's us!) is a French non-for-profit organization created in 2004, dedicated <strong>to popular education</strong> on digital matters. Our small association (under 40 members, under 10 employees) is known to have made the <a href="https://degooglisons-internet.org">"De-google-ify the Internet" project</a>, offering 34 ethical and alternative online tools.
Our association creates digital tools (services, courses and resources, software) to equip the people who participate in a "contribution society". Amongst these, we lead the development of federated software PeerTube and Mobilizon (an upcoming alternative to Facebook events, pages and groups).
Recognised as being of general interest, over 95% of our association's budget comes from donations made by people who support and trust us.
Learn more about Framasoft
Guest designer
Throughout this development period we will be improving the user experience and interface of PeerTube to provide more clarity and power at every level of use.
« Independent designer, UX researcher who seeks to acquire a thorough and deep understanding of uses and design user-friendly, ethical and inclusive tools. »
value
Our content selection
Our contents selection
Our plugin selection
Our plugins selection
Does PeerTube ensure federation compatibility with previous versions?
Does PeerTube offer moderation tools?
Does PeerTube support horizontal scaling?
How do I install PeerTube?
How do I report PeerTube content?
How does PeerTube count views?
I don't like the name "PeerTube"
I have found a security vulnerability in PeerTube. Where and how should I report it?
If it's free, can we upload illegal stuff on PeerTube?
Is "PeerTube" a registered trademark?
Is PeerTube a neutral software?
Is PeerTube's purpose to replace YouTube?
PeerTube does not contain all the tools I need to manage my instance
Should I have a big server to run PeerTube?
There are many bad/porn videos on PeerTube!
What are the PeerTube features for administrators?
What are the PeerTube features for content creators?
What are the PeerTube features for developers?
What are the PeerTube features for viewers?
What are the main advantages of PeerTube?
What is PeerTube's policy about content monetization?
What is PeerTube?
What is the PeerTube release policy?
Who is working on PeerTube?
Why do you let bad people use or upload bad videos on PeerTube?
Why does PeerTube use ActivityPub and WebRTC? Why not IPFS / DTube / Steemit?
Why hosting the code on GitHub and Framagit?
FAQ
A few questions to discover PeerTube
PeerTube Presentation
PeerTube is software that you install on a web server. It allows you to create a video hosting website, so create your "homemade YouTube".
The difference to YouTube is that it's not intended to create a huge platform centralizing videos from the whole world on a single server farm (which is horribly expensive).
On the contrary, PeerTube's concept is to create a network of multiple small interconnected video hosting providers.
PeerTube is unique because (as far as we know) it's the only video hosting web application which combines three advantages:
An open code under a free/libre license
PeerTube is freely provided, no need to pay to install it on your server;
We can look under the hood of PeerTube (its source code): it's auditable, transparent;
It can be enhanced by everyone's contributions.
A federation of interconnected hosting providers
It decentralizes video storage and decision-making power;
We can display videos and accounts of other PeerTube websites;
It's based on <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://activitypub.rocks">ActivityPub</a> to connect with tools <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://peertube.cpy.re/videos/watch/da2b08d4-a242-4170-b32a-4ec8cbdca701">like Mastodon</a> for example.
Peer-to-peer broadcasting
It reduces server bandwidth overload if a video becomes viral;
We become an actor of the video broadcasting;
It's based on <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WebRTC">WebRTC</a>, a free and open-source project for web browsers.
PeerTube is developed by <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framasoft.org">Framasoft</a>, a French non-profit popular educational organization on digital issues.
It employs a developer, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz">Chocobozzz</a>, who works since 2018 on PeerTube projects:
Development of new features and software maintenance;
Thoughts on the architecture, the design and the future of PeerTube;
New stable releases preparation and communication (blog posts, changelog, etc.);
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://joinpeertube.org">Official PeerTube website</a> development and maintenance;
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://packages.joinpeertube.org/api/v1/ping">PeerTube plugins index</a> development and maintenance;
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://instances.joinpeertube.org">PeerTube instances index</a> development and maintenance;
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://search.joinpeertube.org/">PeerTube videos/channels search index</a> development and maintenance;
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org">PeerTube documentation website</a> development and maintenance;
PeerTube support and discussions on bugtrackers, forum, IRC or by email;
Pull requests/merge requests reviews, merges, and support of features added by external contributions (bug fixes, documentation, refactor, etc.);
Maintenance of several PeerTube instances (peertube.cpy.re, peertube2.cpy.re, etc.).
Moreover, Chocobozzz works on internal Framasoft's projects (<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framapad.org">Framapad</a>, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framatalk.org">Framatalk</a>, etc.). In other words, the management of PeerTube projects is operated by only one employee, who has other responsabilities in addition to his workload.
Other Framasoft's volunteers and salaried members also contribute to the PeerTube project on various aspects (strategy, communication, development, community animation). Nevertheless, PeerTube is not developed by a startup with a team of 50 people, and a workflow full of hyper-formatted processes.
Framasoft will therefore takes the time to improve the software progressively, at its own pace and with its atypical methods which, so far, have proven to be rather effective.
No it is not.
PeerTube is a software created, developed and maintained by <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framasoft.org">Framasoft</a>, a French non-profit popular educational organization on digital issues. Framasoft has a French culture, respects French laws and is a political actor (« who participates in the life of the city-state ») of civil society.
PeerTube is part of several actions assembled by Framasoft in the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://contributopia.org">Contributopia roadmap</a>. These actions aim to propose alternative digital tools to those coming from surveillance capitalism, so that people who do not recognize themselves in such a system can create spaces of freedom.
Consequently, PeerTube development and/or management of websites associated with the PeerTube project (<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://joinpeertube.org">joinpeertube.org</a>, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://instances.joinpeertube.org">instances.joinpeertube.org</a>, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://search.joinpeertube.org/">search.joinpeertube.org</a>, etc.) may not please everyone (in particular because of different ideas, ideologies of cultures).
We respect that, and remind that all software of the PeerTube project is free software and can be installed with their own domain name.
We can answer with certainty: no!
The ambition remains to be <strong>a free and decentralized alternative</strong>: the goal of an alternative is not to replace, but to propose something else, with different values, in parallel to what already exists.
Yes, Framasoft holds the "PeerTube" trademark in several countries for preventive purposes.
Framasoft affirms here its intention to not use intellectual property for predatory purposes or to constrain legitimate uses of the software. However, Framasoft reserves the right to use trademark law, especially in case of damage to the image of the PeerTube project, edited by Framasoft.
We recommend you to create your own digital identity, without using "PeerTube" for your project (software name, website domain...) to not confuse people about who is behind the website/project.
For more information, please refer to our <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framasoft.org/en/trademarks">Trademark Code of Conduct</a>.
PeerTube is just the name of the software. You can install it on your server, and choose the name you want. For example, Framasoft's PeerTube instance is named <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framatube.org/">Framatube</a>.
For those who want to watch videos
Become a part of the broadcasting of the videos you are watching
Help the PeerTube website to share videos and lives using P2P
Easily disable P2P in your account if logged-in or in your anonymous settings
Customize the interface
Update your name, avatar or description in <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-setup-account?id=update-your-profile">your profile</a>
Set your appropriate NSFW policy (display, blur or hide NSFW videos)
Choose a PeerTube theme to change the look and feel of the interface
Automatically filter videos depending on their language
Choose your autoplay policy
Manage your library
Use the built-in <em>Watch Later</em> playlist and add easily videos in it
Organize videos in public or private <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-library?id=video-history">playlists</a>
Automatically resume videos from the last time you watched them
Check your watch history in a dedicated page
Subscribe to channels
Subscribe to local or remote channels to be notified when they publish videos
Display videos of your subscriptions in a dedicated page
Share and interact with videos and playlists
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-watch-video">Share</a> the video or the playlist URL/embed with attributes (automatically start/stop at, loop enabled, muted...)
Download a video using a dedicated modal
Comment, reply and rate videos using PeerTube or an ActivityPub compatible software (Mastodon, Pleroma...)
Search videos or channels
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-search">Search</a> local or remote videos and channels
Use many advanced filters (tags, category, licence...)
Use the video URL or channel handle/URL to fetch remote content
PeerTube is not a service, PeerTube is free software. This means that anyone can download and install PeerTube to host videos on a specific domain name (this is called "hosting a PeerTube instance/website"). Framasoft has no control over who downloads PeerTube, and who installs or uses it. Nor does Microsoft or Adobe have any control over who uses Word or Photoshop and for what purposes.
Framasoft only hosts and promotes one PeerTube instance: <a href="https://framatube.org" target="_blank">https://framatube.org</a>
Also, Framasoft hosts and promotes only one PeerTube search index: <a href="https://sepiasearch.org" target="_blank">https://sepiasearch.org</a>
This is not true. In September 2021, the 900 instances listed on our <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://instances.joinpeertube.org/instances">public index</a> host ~1% videos tagged as NSFW (i. e. the content is sensitive, which could be something else than pornography).
Administrators have full control of the content they want to display, and how they want to display it. In the default configuration, PeerTube hides NSFW videos.
See the dedicated section in the PeerTube documentation: <a href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-report" target="_blank">https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-report</a>
Your web browser sends a view to the server after 30 seconds of playback. If a video is less than 30 seconds in length, a view is sent after 75% of the video duration. After giving a view, that IP address cannot add another view in the next hour. Views are buffered, so don't panic if the view counter stays the same after you watched a video.
For those who want to upload videos
Find the PeerTube website that suits you best
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="/instances">Join a PeerTube community</a> depending on its topic, terms of services or code of conduct
Talk to administrators and moderators that are real people, not robots
Upload and import videos
Upload or import videos from the web (Youtube, Dailymotion...) or from a torrent file
Set metadata: category, licence, language, tags, description, thumbnail...
Choose <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-create-upload-video?id=video-confidentiality-options-what-do-they-mean">video privacy</a>: public, unlisted, internal or private
Add <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-create-upload-video?id=captions">subtitles</a>
Easily disable comments or download
Upload an audio file and an image and let PeerTube take care of creating the video!
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-create-upload-video?id=publish-a-live-in-peertube-gt-v3">Publish live videos</a> in PeerTube using your favorite RTMP compatible software (OBS, Restream, ffmpeg...)
Create permanent lives to stream multiple times inside the same live (URL doesn't change for the viewers)
Let PeerTube create a replay of your live
Manage your channels
Create <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-library?id=video-channels">multiple channels</a> inside your account to group your videos by topic
Brand your channel using a dedicated name, a banner and an avatar
Set a <em>Support</em> button for your channel to explain how to support your work
People can subscribe to your channel from a PeerTube website or from an ActivityPub compatible software (Mastodon, Pleroma...)
Create public <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use-library?id=playlist">playlists</a> assigned to your channel to organize your content or remote videos
Being free doesn't mean being above the law! Each PeerTube hosting provider can decide on its own general conditions of use, abiding by their local laws.
For example, in France, discriminatory content <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lois_contre_le_racisme_et_les_discours_de_haine">is prohibited</a> and may be reported to authorities. PeerTube allows users to report problematic videos, and administrator must then apply its moderation in accordance with its terms and conditions and the law.
There are none at the moment: PeerTube is a tool that we wanted neutral in terms of monetization.
For now, the solution proposed the <strong>support</strong> button under the video. This button displays a frame in which people who upload videos can display text, images, and links freely (link to Patreon, Tipeee, Paypal, Liberapay...).
We did not go any further, as we refuse to tie our code to a particular content funding method, that might not fit all communities and deter others. It's the reason why we encourage developers to use the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/contribute-plugins">PeerTube plugin API</a> to create their own monetization system.
For PeerTube administrators
Free and open-source software
Install PeerTube on your server and create your "homemade YouTube"
Official <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/install-docker">Docker support</a>
Documented <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/api-rest-reference.html">REST API</a> and <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/maintain-tools">CLI tools</a>
Federation with ActivityPub
Enable or disable federation for your instance
Display videos/accounts of other instances on yours
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/admin-following-instances?id=automatically-follow-other-instances">Automatically follow</a> instances from a public index
P2P with WebRTC
Reduce your server bandwidth using P2P on VOD and live videos
Enable or disable easily P2P for your instance
Help (or get help) other instances using <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/admin-following-instances?id=instances-redundancy">PeerTube redundancy</a>
Video transcoding
Optimize videos and generate <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/admin-configuration?id=vod-transcoding">multiple resolutions</a> using ffmpeg
Enable additional video extension (.mkv, .mov, .avi...) or audio uploads
Generate HLS playlists or raw MP4 files
Customize ffmpeg transcoding profile using PeerTube plugins
Live streaming transcoding
Enable <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/admin-configuration?id=live-streaming">live streaming</a> for your instance
Add ability for your users to publish a replay of live videos
Set simultaneous live streaming limits (per user/instance)
Enable live streaming transcoding in multiple resolutions
Customize ffmpeg live transcoding profile using PeerTube plugins
Video imports
Enable video import using youtube-dl (Youtube, Dailymotion...)
Enable video import using webtorrent (torrent file or magnet URI)
Enable signups and set a max users and upload limits
Assign <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/admin-moderation">moderator/admin</a> roles
Manage abuse reports on videos, accounts or comments using a dedicated dashboard
Automatically block videos from untrusted users awaiting a review by moderators
Block specific videos and specify a reason
Ban local users, mute accounts or instances
Highly configurable
Easily set instance metadata: name, description, main categories...
Search and install PeerTube <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/admin-customize-instance">plugins or themes</a>
Use external auth (LDAP, OpenID Connect...) using auth plugins
Set the default NSFW policy (hide, blur or display these videos)
Choose your trending algorithm
Broadcast a message to users using a banner
The <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/install-any-os">installation guide is here</a> (only in English).
If you need help, check the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://joinpeertube.org/help">help page</a>.
PeerTube should run happily on a virtual machine with 2 threads/vCPUs, at least 1 Gb of RAM and enough storage for videos. In terms of bandwidth, a lot will depend on which PeerTube instances you federate with and what your relation with them is (more about that below).
As a real life example, the PeerTube demonstration server https://peertube.cpy.re runs on 2 vCores and 2GB of RAM. Average consumption is:
CPU: nginx ~ 2%, peertube ~ 10%, postgres ~ 1%, redis ~ 1%
RAM: nginx ~ 1MB, peertube ~ 150MB, postgres ~ 30MB, redis ~ 20MB
Network: ~200GB sent per month (https://framatube.org: ~1.5TB sent per month)
CPU
Except for video transcoding, a PeerTube instance is not CPU bound. Neither Nginx, PeerTube itself, PostgreSQL nor Redis require a lot of computing power. If it were only for those, one could easily get by with just one thread/vCPU.
You will hugely benefit from at least a second thread though, because of transcoding. Transcoding is very cpu intensive. It serves two purposes on a PeerTube instance: it ensures all videos can be played optimally in the web interface, and it generates different resolutions for the same video. PeerTube support for offloading transcoding to other machines is <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/issues/947">being discussed</a>, but not yet implemented.
RAM
1/2 GB of RAM should be plenty for a basic PeerTube instance, which usually takes at most 150 MB in RAM. The only reason you might want more would be if you colocate your Redis or PostgreSQL services on a non-SSD system.
Storage
There are two important angles to storage: disk space usage and sustained read speed. To make a rough estimate of your disk space usage requirements, you want to know the answer to three questions:
What is the total size of the videos you wish to stream?
Do you want to enable transcoding? If so, do you want to provide multiple resolutions per video? Try this out with a few videos and you will get an idea of how much extra space is required per video and estimate a multiplication factor for future space allocation.
Which sharing mechanisms do you want to enable? Just WebTorrent, or also HLS with p2p? If you want both, this will double your storage needs.
In terms of read speed, you want to make sure that you can saturate your network uplink serving PeerTube videos. This should not be a problem with SSD disks, whereas traditional HDD should be accounted for: typical sustained read rates for a well tuned system with a 7200rpm hard disk should hover around 120 MB/s or 960 Mbit/s. The latter should be enough for a typical 1 Gbit/s network uplink.
Network
A rough estimate of a traditional server's video streaming network capacity is usually quite straightforward. You simply divide your server's available bandwidth by the average bandwidth per stream, and you have an upper bound.
Take a server for example with a 1 Gbit/s uplink for example pushing out 1080p60 streams at 5 Mbit/s per stream. That means the absolute theoretical upper capacity bound is 200 simultaneous viewers if your server's disk i/o can keep up. Expect a bit less in practice.
But what if you need to serve more users? That's where PeerTube's federation feature shines. If other PeerTube instances following yours, chances are they have decided to mirror part of your instance! The feature is called "server redundancy" and caches your most popular videos to help serve additional viewers. While viewers themselves contribute a little additional bandwidth while watching the video in their browsers (mostly during surges), mirroring servers have a much greater uplink and will help your instance with sustained higher concurrent streaming.
No it doesn't. You can't deploy multiple PeerTube nodes behind a load balancer.
As far as we know, there are 3 limitations to handle a large amount of users in PeerTube:
Bandwidth: can be mitigated using <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/admin-following-instances?id=instances-redundancy">PeerTube redundancy system</a> and cache servers that serve video static files in front of your PeerTube instance
Storage: can be mitigated using <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/admin-remote-storage">S3/Object storage</a>
Video transcoding: we may implement <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/issues/947">transcoding by remote workers</a> in the future
If you notice performance problems or a bottleneck at your scale, don't hesitate to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/issues/new/choose">create an issue</a> to discuss it.
Framasoft tries to make around 4 major releases per year. Releasing a new PeerTube version takes a lot of our time, so we cannot change this release cycle.
There is no LTS version: only the latest stable version of PeerTube is supported by Framasoft.
If you want to test the PeerTube develop branch, we provide <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://builds.joinpeertube.org/nightly/">nightly builds</a>.
We <strong>try</strong> to keep compatibility with the latest minor version (2.3.1 with 2.2 for example). Unfortunately we don't have enough resources to keep compatibility with other versions.
"It's outrageous and unconscionable: you're releasing a PeerTube version that doesn't contain the necessary tools to effectively manage videos claimed by rights holders, or to effectively manage the issue of online harassment in comments, or to effectively manage monetization through advertising, or to (insert here your request to PeerTube). It will never work! What do you intend to do about it?"
You're right. PeerTube is not the perfect tool, far from it. And we never promised this software would include all the features corresponding to every use cases.
Remember that PeerTube has only <a href="#who-is-working-on-peertube">one full time developer</a> and a small handful of very involved volunteers. It is not a product developed by a start-up with a full time team and significant financial support.
So if you feel that PeerTube does not currently meet your needs, it's simple: don't use it right now. We remind you that we don't make money developing PeerTube, and if we obviously hope for its success, Framasoft does not depend on it to continue its activities.
<a href="#what-are-the-peertube-features-for-administrators">Yes it does!</a> Since the first stable release of PeerTube in October 2018, <strong>every release</strong> added or improved moderation features:
<strong>PeerTube 1.1</strong> added bulk actions in the admin users table and instance/account muting;
<strong>PeerTube 1.2</strong> added the ability to unfederate a video on blacklist; the notification system now shows reports, and new users;
<strong>PeerTube 1.3</strong> added the possibility for admins to automatically quarantine new videos for new/untrusted users until a moderator reviews it. The instance's followers management was also reworked: UI is improved, follows can be denied;
<strong>PeerTube 1.4</strong> added a plugin system, and made sure plugins can for instance automatically blacklist videos or reject comments based on any rule (similar to Pleroma MRF);
<strong>PeerTube 2.0</strong> setup now asks the admin to answer questions regarding their moderation policy and dedication to it. Make a feature to automatically follow a public index of PeerTube instances part of core PeerTube, instead of leaving admins to script it themselves. This allows instance administrators to automatically follow instances of a "follow list" of their choice; a list which is self-hostable, so that communities can grow at their own pace;
<strong>PeerTube 2.1</strong> added an <em>internal</em> privacy mode to videos (such videos won't be shared outside of the instance), and added quick access to moderation tools below the comments and hooks to create registration plugins (geoblocking or captchas for example); some third-party plugins already demonstrate this ability. This release also put emphasis on describing moderation features within the interface: warnings for features that might increase moderation work like autofollow, and descriptions to the action dropdowns.
<strong>PeerTube 2.2</strong> greatly improved video abuses management (search, abuses display, actions on the video or account etc), added moderation hooks and helpers in the plugins API and Framasoft developed an experimental <em>Auto mute</em> plugin based on public lists.
<strong>PeerTube 2.3</strong> improved the report modal and added predefined reasons selection. This version made it possible to delete all the comments of an account and Framasoft developed an experimental <em>Auto block videos</em> plugin based on public lists.
<strong>PeerTube 2.4</strong> added ability to report accounts and comments, a messaging system between the local reporter of an abuse and moderators, and an abuse management view for users.
<strong>PeerTube 3.0</strong> added a dedicated view to manage comments of the instance (list, filter, remove in bulk etc).
PeerTube developers are committed to develop and improve moderation tools to make instances always easier to manage. We welcome you to take part in discussions to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/issues">help ongoing efforts</a> in that direction or <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/issues/new">suggest new ones</a>!
Technical
View, share and update <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube">PeerTube code</a>
Join a community of admins, video makers and viewers
PeerTube REST API
Test PeerTube REST API with the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/api-rest-getting-started">getting started guide</a>
Check the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/api-rest-reference.html">REST API documentation</a>
Get help on <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framacolibri.org/c/peertube">PeerTube forum</a>
Player embed API
Use the PeerTube player embed on your website
Control the PeerTube player embed using the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/api-embed-player">embed API</a>
Plugins & Themes
Develop plugins and themes using the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/contribute-plugins">getting started guide</a>
Check the complete <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/api-plugins">plugin/theme documentation</a>
Get help on <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://framacolibri.org/c/peertube">PeerTube forum</a> or ask new plugin/theme API in <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube">PeerTube issues</a>
PeerTube uses ActivityPub because this federation protocol is recommended by the W3C and is also used by other projects like the social network <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://joinmastodon.org/">Mastodon</a>.
IPFS is a great technology, but it still seems too young for streaming large files. The PeerTube P2P system based on well established protocols like HTTP and WebRTC, and the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://docs.joinpeertube.org/admin-following-instances?id=instances-redundancy">redundancy system</a> are more easy for us to use and to maintain.
DTube does not seem open source, because publishing only compiled code hinders freedom of modification.
PeerTube does not impose any remuneration model. This is the choice we have made, and others (like DTube) have made other choices. So it's up to you to see what suits you.
Historical reason.
We have a policy for contributions related to security. Please refer to <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/security">our security policy and advisories</a>.
Hall of Fame
Sponsors
Financial Contributors
Contributors
Questions on PeerTube? Need help? You've come to the right place!
Better understand and use PeerTube
You have a question?
Discover our FAQ
Need a detailed guide?
Read the documentation
Ask questions to the community
Go to the forum
For PeerTube admins
Install PeerTube
Upgrade PeerTube
Administer PeerTube
Contribute to PeerTube
How to contribute?
Learn more about free/libre software
Learn more about the federation
Skip to content
PeerTube, a free software to take back control of your videos
Free software to take back control of your videos
Search for PeerTube videos, channels and playlists
V4 is here!
PeerTube V4 with channel customization, playlists search, custom instance homepage and more video filters is out!
PeerTube, developed by Framasoft, is the free and decentralized alternative to video platforms, providing you over %{ videos } videos published by %{ users } users and viewed over %{ views } million times
<a href="https://framablog.org/2021/11/30/peertube-v4-more-power-to-help-you-present-your-videos/" target="_blank" class="bottom-link"> Read the blog post </a>
See the instances list
Discover our content selection
Browse contents
What is
?
PeerTube aspires to be a <strong>decentralized and free/libre alternative</strong> to video broadcasting services.
Our aim is not to replace them, but rather to simultaneously offer something else, with different values.
A federation of interconnected hosting services
PeerTube is not meant to become a huge platform that would centralize videos from all around the world.
Rather, it is <strong>a network of inter-connected small videos hosters</strong>.
Anyone with a modicum of technical skills can host a PeerTube server, aka an instance. Each instance hosts its users and their videos. In this way, <strong>every instance is created, moderated and maintained independently by various administrators.</strong>
Discover PeerTube instances
You can still watch from your account videos hosted by other instances though if the administrator of your instance had previously connected it with other instances.
This is just how a <strong>federation</strong> works!
And there's more! PeerTube uses <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://activitypub.rocks">ActivityPub</a>, a federating protocol that <strong>allows you to interact with other software</strong>, provided they also use this protocol. For example, PeerTube and Mastodon -a Twitter alternative- are connected: <strong>you can follow a PeerTube user from Mastodon</strong> (the latest videos from the PeerTube account you follow will appear in your feed), <strong>and even comment on a PeerTube-hosted video directly from your Mastodon's account.</strong>
Open-source, free/libre license code
Mainstream online video broadcasting services make money off of your data by analyzing your interactions so that they can then bombard your with targeted advertising.
Peertube is not subject to any corporate monopoly, does not rely on ads and <strong>does not track you.</strong>
Most importantly, <strong>you are a person to PeerTube, not a product in need of profiling so as to be stuck in video loops.</strong> For example, PeerTube doesn't use any biased recommendation algorithms to keep you online for hours on end.
All of this is made possible by Peertube's free/libre license (GNU-AGPL). Its code is a digital "common", that belongs to everybody, instead of a secret formula that belongs to Google (in the case of Youtube) or to Vivendi/Bolloré (Dailymotion). This free/libre license <strong>guarantees our fundamental freedoms as users and allows many contributors to offer evolutions and new features.</strong>
Are you a video maker?
With PeerTube, choose <strong>your hosting company and the rules you believe in.</strong>
YouTube has clearly gone astray: its hoster, Google-Alphabet, can enforce its ContentID system (the infamous "Robocopyright") or its videos recommendation system, all of which appear to be as obscure as unfair.
Direct contact with a human-scale hoster allows for two things: you no longer are the client of a huge tech company, and <strong>you can nurture a special relationship with your hoster, who distributes your data.</strong>
With PeerTube, you get to choose your hosting provider according to their terms of use, such as their disk space limit per user, their moderation policy, who they chose to federate with... You are not speaking with a huge tech company, so you can talk it out in case of any issue, need, desire...
Browse/discover PeerTube instances
About peer-to-peer broadcasting and watching
The PeerTube software can, whenever necessary, use a peer-to-peer protocol (P2P) to broadcast viral videos, <strong>lowering the load of their hosts.</strong>
In this way, when you watch a video, your computer contributes to its broadcast. If a lot of people are watching the same video at the same time, their browser automatically send smalls pieces of the video to the other viewers. <strong>The server resources are not over-exploited</strong>: the stream is split, the network optimized.
It might not look like it, but thanks to peer-to-peer broadcasting, popular video makers and their videos are no longer forced to be hosted by big companies, whose infrastructure can stand thousands of views at the same time... or to pay for a robust but extremely expensive independent video host.
Your move!
Sign up
Enjoy every feature: history, subscriptions, playlists, notifications...
Who is behind
Peertube is a <strong>free/libre software funded by a French non-profit organization</strong>: Framasoft
Our organization started in 2004, and now devotes itself <strong>to popular education about digital technology issues.</strong> We are a small structure of less than 40 members and under 10 employees, well-known for the De-google-ify Internet project, when we offered 34 ethical and alternative online tools. As a public interest organization, <strong>over 90% of our funding comes from donations</strong> (tax deductible for French taxpayers).
Thanks to our <a href="/hall-of-fame" target="_blank">crowdfunding (from March to July 2018)</a>, <strong>Framasoft were able to employ PeerTube's main developer.</strong> After a beta release in March 2018, release 1 came out in November 2018. Since then, several intermediary releases have brought many features along. Several collectives have already created PeerTube hosts, laying the foundation for the federation.
The more people use, support, and contribute to PeerTube, the quicker it will become a concrete alternative to platforms like YouTube.
Donate to Framasoft
If you would like to interact with videos (like, comment, download...), subscribe to channels, create playlists or play videos, then all you have to do is <strong>create an account on the PeerTube instance of your choice.</strong>
PeerTube instances
1. Find the instance that suits you best
By <strong>filtering according to your profile</strong> (video maker or viewer), <strong>topics</strong> that you are looking for or <strong>languages</strong> you speak, <strong>find an instance whose rules match your needs!</strong>
2. Create your account and enjoy PeerTube
A username, an email, a password and you can already <strong>enjoy all the features of PeerTube!</strong>
PeerTube news archive
PeerTube news!
Discover the latest PeerTube improvements
See older news
PeerTube news
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Thanks to our crowdfunfing contributors, PeerTube V3 with live streaming support, global search, playlists embed and more moderation tools is out!
2020 roadmap
<a href="https://framablog.org/2021/01/07/peertube-v3-its-a-live-a-liiiiive/" target="_blank"> Read the blog post for more information </a>
Let's pave the way to PeerTube live streaming in v3!
Support the development of PeerTube!
Donate, share: we will need all the help we can get to complete this roadmap.
raised in %{ days } day
contributors
Step 1
(June)
Search through the fediverse
Ability to create search indexes
Instance broadcast messages
WIP to improve UX/UI
A roadmap in 4 steps
Step 2
Moderation
(July)
From June to November 2020, Framasoft will develop new features and improvements for PeerTube. We have broken down this roadmap into 4 main steps, each with its own schedule and cost, leading to the addition of peer-to-peer powered live streaming to PeerTube v3.
Feedback on reports
Making moderation easier
Sharing blocklists (spam)
These developments are funded by donations made to our small nonprofit organization: Framasoft. We will be raising funds progressively over the next six months of development, so that you can help us in our efforts.
Step 3
(Aug. - Sept.)
Online playlists sharing
Plugins (annotations, etc)
Promoting plugins
Step 4
(Oct. - Nov.)
Peer-to-peer (30s - 1min lag)
No chat, no gifs, no ❤️ 👍
Post-live publishing
Learn more about those steps
"Another" world cannot be built using surveillance capitalism's tools.
Making it easier to access content, sharing power and responsibilities, opening up to contributions, generalizing live broadcasting thanks to peer-to-peer... PeerTube’s v3 aims to consolidate it as an alternative to Google-Youtube and Facebook-Live that is more and more convivial.
<a href="https://framablog.org/2020/05/26/our-plans-for-peertube-v3-progressive-fundraising-live-streaming-coming-next-fall">Read Framasoft's statement on the Framablog</a>
The money donated via this form will be exclusively dedicated to the PeerTube project.
Share and follow
Thank you very much for your donation to the PeerTube project!
Thank you
Thanks to you, Framasoft’s teams will be able to continue and expand the work already started on this software.
The success of this fundraising depends only on you: <strong>we need you</strong> to raise awareness about this roadmap, so we can share our enthousiasm about Peertube's v3.
Feel free <strong>to share your gesture</strong> on your favourite social networks and to talk about PeerTube around you!