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Hi all, I’m relatively new to this whole self-hosting thing and I have been loving it. I have several instances setup on my Debian server except for an audiobooks one. My wife loves audiobooks and asked me a way she can get audiobooks on the fly. I have searched online and found many.

Audiobookshelf is the most recommended one, but I don’t really know much about it beside what I read. Most of it I didn’t understand since I’ve never set up anything like that before. I don’t know the technical details on audiobooks like I do on music for example. So I’m not sure. Audiobookshelf has an app for iOS in test flight but its beta is full. And every client for it has an “in-app purchase” tag and I’m not sure what they hide behind a paywall. I’ve also read that Navidrome (which I already have set up on the sever) works, too but it needs to be “tagged” correctly. I’m not sure how to and what to use to tag audiobooks. I use kid3 for music, would it work for books, too?

I don’t want to commit and go through the whole setup then end up hitting roadblocks. So any info would be very much appreciated.

Thank you all.

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[-] fizzle@quokk.au 1 points 16 hours ago

I just sync the titles I want to listen to, to my phone using syncthing.

It just works reliably in all cases with no dicking around.

Audiobookshelf is fine, but if Wife Approval Factor is important this is what I'd do.

That said my partner and I are both team android so if you're iOS then your SOL with syncthing I think.

[-] DonutsRMeh@lemmy.world 2 points 13 hours ago

Yes, the wife is hardcore iPhone. That’s all she used her whole life. I’ve setup Audiobookshelf and it’s not bad. Kinda looks like jellyfin in a way. Still experimenting

this post was submitted on 18 Feb 2026
44 points (97.8% liked)

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