Kanema with Jellyfin or Emby

Kanema plays the films and series on your own Jellyfin or Emby server, on Apple TV, iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Vision Pro, in the same app as your live channels and TV guide. Where you got to, and what you’ve watched, stay in step with the server.

Coming soon to the App Store

A Jellyfin server open in Kanema on a MacBook Air: Continue watching, then the server’s films as posters, Spring, Charge, Wing It!, Sprite Fright, Coffee Run, Tears of Steel and Sintel, and its series below. — Demo playlist: the films are Blender open movies (credits) and the channels are made up. Kanema comes with nothing to watch.

Sign in

Choose Add a playlist, pick a media server, then Jellyfin or Emby, and give the server’s address, your username, and your password if you have one. They’re sent only to your server and kept in the Keychain. Kanema has no account of its own and no server in between.

Your libraries in Kanema

Each film or TV show library on the server becomes a category under Films or Series, newest first, with its artwork. Music, photos and the server’s Live TV aren’t read. Live channels come from an IPTV playlist, or from an HDHomeRun tuner or a Tvheadend server on your home network.

A Jellyfin server’s films in Kanema on Apple TV: 11 films, a search button, the server’s Films library as a category, and posters for Spring, Charge, Wing It!, Sprite Fright, Coffee Run and Tears of Steel. Beside the TV, an Apple TV 4K and its Siri Remote.

Resume points and watched marks

Kanema reads where you stopped and what you’ve watched from the server, and sends it back. Mark as watched marks the title on the server too, and while you watch, Kanema reports the playback to the server. If you got further on another device, whichever position is newer wins.

How it plays

Files play as they are, without the server converting them: VLC opens nearly anything a library holds. With Apple’s own player chosen in Settings, an MP4 or MOV in H.264 or HEVC plays there directly, with HDR10 and Dolby Vision, and the server repackages anything else for it with the picture copied rather than converted. On Apple Vision Pro, Kanema always plays through VLC.

With Kanema Pro, Skip intro and Skip credits use Jellyfin’s media segments (Jellyfin 10.10 or later) or Emby’s chapter markers.

On the Mac and everywhere else

The sign-in is the same on every device: on a Mac it’s File › Add Playlist, then Plex, Jellyfin or Emby. A server counts as a playlist. The free version holds one, so a server on its own is free; Kanema Pro lets you keep it beside an IPTV playlist or another server, and syncs them to your other devices through iCloud.

Kanema isn’t made by the Jellyfin project or by Emby, and isn’t connected to either.

Free and Pro, feature by feature

Adding a Jellyfin server on a MacBook Air: fields for the server address, a username and a password if it has one, and a note that they are sent only to your server and kept in the Keychain.

It doesn’t come with channels

Kanema plays the playlist you add from your own provider, and nothing else. Only add services you’re entitled to use.