Curacast ships as a single container, and natively for macOS. On most home servers that means a search box and an Install button — no terminal, no config files.
The easiest route. Curacast is in Community Applications.
That's Community Applications. If you don't have it, install it from the Unraid forums first — it's the standard app store for Unraid.
Pick the standard template, or the NVIDIA one if you want hardware transcoding on an Nvidia GPU.
The defaults are correct for most systems. Change the WebUI port only if something else already uses 8000.
Unraid pulls the image and starts it. Then open the WebUI from the Docker tab.
Through Container Manager or Container Station. No SSH needed.
Called Container Station on QNAP. Install it from the Package Center / App Center if it isn't there.
Curacast™curacast/curacast
Download the latest tag.
Set the port and folder as below, then start it.
| Setting | Value |
|---|---|
| Local port | 8000 → container 8000 |
| Mount folder | a new shared folder, e.g. /docker/curacast |
| Mount path | /home/curacast/app/.curacast |
| Auto-restart | enabled |
Added as a custom app.
Repository curacast/curacast, tag
latest.
Add a port: node port 8000 →
container port 8000.
Add a host-path volume mounted at
/home/curacast/app/.curacast, pointing at a dataset you've
created for it.
Native, through Homebrew. Apple silicon and Intel. No Docker, no virtual machine — the right fit for a Mac mini sitting next to Plex.
# in Terminal brew trust curacast/curacast # Homebrew 6 or newer; older versions skip this line brew tap curacast/curacast brew install curacast brew services start curacast
One command from brew.sh. It's the standard package manager for macOS.
Homebrew 6 asks you to trust a third-party tap before it will read it; that is the first line. Then it pulls Curacast and its video encoder (with Apple's hardware encoding) and registers a background service that starts at login and survives reboots.
http://localhost:8000Your data lives in
$(brew --prefix)/var/curacast. Back that folder up.
brew upgrade curacast && brew services restart curacast.
Your channels and settings are kept.
http://localhost:8000 — use the tuner URL shown in Curacast's
Settings, which carries the streaming key.Through Docker Desktop, entirely in its interface.
Free for personal use. It will set up WSL2 for you if it isn't already there.
curacast/curacastUse the search bar at the top of Docker Desktop, then click Run.
Set the host port to 8000,
and add a volume: pick a folder on your machine and mount it at
/home/curacast/app/.curacast.
Then open http://localhost:8000.
Docker Compose. Save as docker-compose.yml and run
docker compose up -d.
services: curacast: image: curacast/curacast:latest container_name: curacast restart: unless-stopped ports: - "8000:8000" volumes: - ./curacast-data:/home/curacast/app/.curacast # Recommended: Curacast needs no Linux capabilities. cap_drop: - ALL security_opt: - no-new-privileges:true
For Intel or AMD hardware transcoding, pass the GPU through by adding:
devices:
- /dev/dri:/dev/dri
Next
Same on every platform.
http://YOUR-SERVER-IP:8000 — or
http://localhost:8000 on the machine itself.
First run asks for a name and a password for the first admin. Curacast is not open to your network before you do. It then shows a recovery key, once — keep it, it's how you reset a forgotten password.
Sign in to Plex, Jellyfin or Emby, or point it at a folder of files.
Two are free for 14 days, so you can confirm it works on your setup before paying anything.
Settings → Licence, paste the key from your confirmation email. Unlimited channels from then on.
Plex → Settings → Live TV & DVR → Set up DVR. Curacast is discovered automatically as an HDHomeRun tuner.