Emby Vs Plex - Emby Now The Best Plex Alternative?

Plex has Been the Dominant Force in Media Center Software For a Long Time. Emby May Now Take The Lead!

Like a beautiful plant, many startups start out as a small seedling, maturing into a beautiful strong vibrant business. Bearing financial fruit for their owners. The lucky few are sold to larger companies for an absurd amount of money. And many of the rest, eventually wither and fade away into obscurity.

Plex Removes Plugins In The Latest Update

Sometimes it only takes a poor business decision like removing all PLUGIN Support and unsupported apps from the latest version of Plex to accelerate this process. The lack of transparency for why they removed the plugins is also concerning. Because Plex said they were not used much. ("Only 2% percent of Plex users used the plugins")

Concern Over Piracy May Be The Real Reason Behind Plugin Removal

Some Plex plugins did contain pirated movies. Although, there were also many other great plugins that did not. It's not like we did not see this coming. Because for a while now any mention of pirated plugins were removed from their forum. They probably came under increasing pressure from content producers. And you can't really can't blame Plex, it's their business and they should run it how they see fit. Will it have an effect on their installed user base? Most likely yes, and many will migrate over to Emby instead.

While Roku removed all channels from their platform that played m3u playlists due to piracy concerns except for one. Other media streamers like Apple TV (SimpleVid) and Nvidia SHIELD and Fire TV users could still add Playlist apps to play m3u playlists installed directly on their platforms from iTunes or the Google Play Store. (GSE Smart IPTV)

Why Use Emby Vs Plex?

The decision to remove all plugins from Plex certainly caused a lot of outrage in the Plex community. And many Plex users are now actively switching over to Emby as an alternative to Plex. Because Emby continues to support 3rd party plugins. And this also includes the IPTV plugin which continues to work with playlists on media streamers like Roku.

Emby is newer software than Plex and while the plugin list is smaller, many developers are now switching over. Some of their plugins include TuneIn Radio, Trakt, and ITV Player.

Emby offers software and apps that work on a wide range of media streamers including Roku. Like Plex, it requires server software that is installed on a PC or NAS. This must be on and running at the same time their app is being used on a media streamer.

Like Plex, Emby also can play all your media software. Because this is really the primary purpose of media player software they both do it quite well. Plex may still be a bit more polished than Emby. Only because it's been around longer.

Emby Less Bloated Than Plex

Many long-time Plex users are not happy with the bloat added and the more expensive hardware needed to run Plex with each version update.

A friend sent us this picture a while back and it sums up quite nicely the direction Plex has gone.

"This is the kind of bragg-y crap that killed Plex and made it an inaccessible option for the average user. The first wave of cord cutters had this wacky vision... to (get this) cut the cord to SAVE money. I knowwww... it's a weird concept. Why do that when we can over-build and brag... and push the system requirements through the roof and create a new money machine. Wow... so intelligent. Sarcasm intended."

Emby, on the other hand, is quite fast and less glitchy, and while they have a premium version which they charge a small monthly or lifetime fee for a few extra features, this is optional. f you're unhappy with the direction Plex is going, give Emby a try. Many longtime Plex users are making the switch. And while there are still a few kinks to be worked out, Emby is now the next best thing in media players. Their software offers a lot of the same features as Plex including the popular Server Sharing and Live Channels features.

Be sure to give Emby a try and see how it compares to Plex. Because if you want to use plugins, Emby is really now the best alternative to using Plex without them.

On Roku Private Channel PlexRetro and RARflix both let you keep your Plex Plugins. PlexRetro returns Plex to the last build before their UI change.

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