Plex has confirmed that it will require a Remote Watch Pass or Plex Pass for remote streaming on its TV apps. The change is going into effect for the Roku app first, followed by all other TV apps and third-party clients in 2026.

Earlier this year, Plex increased its pricing for Plex Pass and stopped supporting all options for free remote streaming in the Plex apps, such as adding a custom server connection in the app settings. The company said at the time, "The reality is that we need more resources to continue putting forth the best personal media experience, and as a result, we will no longer offer remote playback as a free feature." That's also when Plex introduced the Remote Watch Pass as a less expensive way to enable remote streaming again.

Plex is now rolling out the remote watch changes to its Roku TV app. If you have Plex Pass, or the owner of the server you're streaming from has Plex Pass, you don't need to do anything. Otherwise, if you are streaming on a different network from the server's home network, you need Plex Pass or Remote Watch Pass.

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[–] bonenode@piefed.social 37 points 16 hours ago (5 children)

Cue all the users with lifetime passes not seeing that this is slowly becoming a problem...

[–] turdas@suppo.fi 32 points 15 hours ago (2 children)

Abandoning streaming services only to become a serf of another commercial subscription service seems like such a bizarre move that I really don't understand how Plex users even exist.

[–] kieron115@startrek.website 2 points 3 hours ago

I bought a lifetime pass for 100 bucks about 10 years ago, and have had 10 years of not having to give a shit about these announcements. I've saved well over 100 bucks on streaming services in that time. Worth it 1000%.

[+] MaggiWuerze@feddit.org -12 points 15 hours ago (3 children)

Wow, could you get any more condescending? We bought a product (10+ years ago in my case) and it still works great. Why would I switch to an inferior service, just because the FREE version of the product I already bought got worse?

This has no impact on anyone that actually paid for Plex.

With this move the free version of Plex got downgraded, to now have feature parity with Jellyfin. Meaning a VPN is required if you want to access your media on the go

[–] turdas@suppo.fi 26 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

I'm not sure if you're joking or not, but you can remotely stream from Jellyfin without using a VPN.

[+] MaggiWuerze@feddit.org -13 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (4 children)

You CAN, but you really shouldn't. Even the documentation says as much. The Jellyfin server is way to insecure to expose it to the open internet. In reality you can't safely use Jellyfin remotely without a vpn

[–] turdas@suppo.fi 20 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 13 hours ago) (2 children)

It does not say that in the documentation. What the documentation does have, however, are extensive instructions on how to make Jellyfin accessible on WAN: https://jellyfin.org/docs/general/post-install/networking/ https://jellyfin.org/docs/general/post-install/networking/reverse-proxy/

[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (1 children)

Note that opening a port gives full access to that port to the next higher Network. Opening a port directly to the Internet is therefore insecure and not recommended.

It says so right there.

There are multiple ways of exposing Jellyfin to the outside - the most common ones are:

forwarding its Ports directly to the internet (not recommended!)

forwarding through a Reverse Proxy

using a VPN connection to enter the Network

use a VPS to Reverse Proxy to your home network

And there.

This smug mentality that security is unnecessary when exposing ports to the open internet reminds me of people who think its fine to drive drunk because "I've done it dozens of times before and nothing happened!" It also reminds me of the mentality of tech company VPs right before they have a massive data breach. It's quite absurd to read.

[–] turdas@suppo.fi 2 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

For some reason they recommend against directly forwarding Jellyfin's ports, but reverse proxies are fine. I expect this is because the default configuration doesn't use SSL.

This smug mentality that security is unnecessary when exposing ports to the open internet reminds me of people who think its fine to drive drunk because "I've done it dozens of times before and nothing happened!" It also reminds me of the mentality of tech company VPs right before they have a massive data breach. It's quite absurd to read.

I think you'll find without exposing ports to the open internet we would not be having this conversation right now. Which, I suppose, wouldn't be such a bad thing.

[–] Mondez@lemdro.id 1 points 9 minutes ago

I've not looked into it but presumably it's because whatever web server framework they are using might not be as bug free and battle tested as dedicated web server application like nginx so by limiting the actual web servers exposure you are limiting the attack surface.

[–] brewery@feddit.uk 2 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

This is good to know, thanks for sharing. I've only got it local for now after installing at the weekend and wasn't sure how secure it was for external access.

[–] Pika@sh.itjust.works 4 points 6 hours ago* (last edited 6 hours ago)

I'm just chiming in to say that while the documentation gives you information on how to do external access, there are multiple issues open on the github about unauthenticated endpoints that if you know what is on the server already, you can confirm that it's there

So I wouldn't use a standard naming convention because using that knowledge, someone who cares could use common names that could be on the server, followed by common standards of formats they would be in, and be able to confirm it's their via the end points.

[–] jjlinux@lemmy.zip 5 points 10 hours ago

'I paid for this shit, and I will not allow it to be disrespected'. Sounds too much like Microsoft and Google apologists.

[–] Auli@lemmy.ca 3 points 8 hours ago

What problems? The ones that everyone keeps posting which are not a big deal. Sure they should get fixed and a lot of them have been.

[–] Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe 1 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

Oh no, someone else could possibly play media from my media server, if they have the exact link for it!

Yea, not ideal, but not exactly the end of the world.

[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

This seems like a naive viewpoint as you're exposing your whole network and everything connected to it to the open internet. Just because the port connects to Jellyfin doesnt mean there isn't some exploit or vulnerability that can allow for greater access. This is media software written by volunteers and offered for free, so I wouldn't expect Fort Knox security from it just because its FOSS. In fact, they specifically put the onus on the user to do this themselves if they so chose.

[–] turdas@suppo.fi 1 points 1 hour ago

I would trust the FOSS software's actually auditable security any day of the week over the sketchy proprietary solution targeting an extremely niche market.

[–] Auli@lemmy.ca 9 points 8 hours ago

Privacy for me. When they where sending out emails about what you watched. Kind of made the we don't know what's on your server line a lie. So how could I trust them. I still expect a massive sting where they have to tell the MPAA or something who has pirated content and they go after people. Surprised it hasn't happened yet seems so obvious.

[–] laurelraven@lemmy.zip 4 points 6 hours ago

This has no impact on anyone that actually paid for Plex.

Yet.

They're going down the pathway to enshittification and very few companies that start down that dark path turn away before they destroy everything good they'd made for everyone, free and paid alike. Maybe that won't happen here, but from all of the times I've seen that same song and dance, I would be finding alternatives to switch to, personally. But, it's obviously up to you to decide your own comfort level if you want to start now or wait to see how far they go

[–] Skunk@jlai.lu 17 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

What do you mean?

To me the problem would be modifying the lifetime pass or simply removing it (for new customers) in favor of a fucking subscription only.

[–] laurelraven@lemmy.zip 2 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

I would be very surprised if they don't go there eventually, and I'd even bet they'll try at some point to force lifetime pass owners to switch to subscription

If you ever think you've found a corpo that can be trusted, no you haven't

[–] Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe 2 points 5 hours ago

Exactly.

Practically every piece of "lifetime" software I've paid for has gone this route.

[–] excursion22@piefed.ca 6 points 6 hours ago

I have a lifetime pass and switched to Jellyfin years ago. Plex shoving their streaming content down my throat while putting my local libraries in the most tedious spots to access in the menus was a very quick turn off.

[–] Auli@lemmy.ca 4 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

I have a lifetime pass and stopped using it. I got my money's worth over the years. No regrets.

[–] brewery@feddit.uk 2 points 8 hours ago

Same. I finally switched over to jellyfin recently as it was low down on a long list of stuff I want to do, let alone need to do. I feel like I got my worth and if things mess up with jellyfin, I've got a temporary backup option to spin up without having to give a single penny more. Fingers crossed, no more of my data either seeing as it's all uninstalled.

[–] metaStatic@kbin.earth 2 points 11 hours ago

I literally only ever open these threads for the cope.