Somebody in your house always wants to watch something that isn't on the server yet. Maybe it's a text message, maybe it's a sticky note on the fridge, maybe it's someone yelling from the other room while you're mid-episode of something else. Either way, you end up opening Radarr or Sonarr yourself, searching, and adding it manually. That gets old fast once more than one person uses your media server.
Overseerr fixes that. It gives everyone in your household a clean, Netflix-style page where they can search for a movie or show and hit "Request." You get a notification, the request either auto-approves or waits for your OK, and Radarr or Sonarr take it from there. No more sticky notes.
This guide walks you through installing Overseerr as its own LXC container on Proxmox VE using the community-scripts installer, then connecting it to your media server and your existing Sonarr/Radarr setup. If you've already followed our guides on installing Sonarr or Radarr in LXC containers, Overseerr is the piece that ties them together for the rest of your family.
What You Will Learn
- What Overseerr actually does and how it fits into a media server setup
- How to deploy Overseerr as a Proxmox VE LXC container in about five minutes
- How to connect Overseerr to Plex or Jellyfin
- How to link Overseerr to Sonarr and Radarr so requests download automatically
- How to fix the errors people run into most often
- A few habits that will save you a headache down the road
What Is This Feature?
Overseerr is a self-hosted request management tool for Plex, Jellyfin, and Emby libraries. Think of it as the front desk for your media server. Instead of giving your family SSH access or teaching them how Radarr's quality profiles work, you give them a web page that looks and feels like a streaming service catalog.
When someone searches for a title and clicks request, Overseerr checks whether you already own it. If you don't, it passes the request to Sonarr (for TV shows) or Radarr (for movies), which then finds the file and adds it to your library automatically. You can require your own approval first, or let trusted users' requests go through automatically.
One thing worth knowing before you install anything: the Overseerr project and Jellyseerr (its Jellyfin-focused fork) are in the process of merging into a single project called Seerr. Overseerr itself is still maintained and works fine today, so this guide is safe to follow, but don't be surprised if you see "Seerr" mentioned in release notes over the next year or two.
Why Would You Use It?
If you're the only person using your Proxmox VE homelab, you can probably skip this one — opening Radarr yourself takes ten seconds. Overseerr earns its keep the moment more than one person relies on your server.
A few situations where it genuinely helps:
- You share Plex or Jellyfin with family or roommates and you're tired of being the manual search engine
- You want a request approval queue instead of giving everyone free rein over your storage
- You want usage limits per person, so one person can't request forty movies in an afternoon
- You want a single dashboard showing what's already available, what's downloading, and what's pending
Running it as its own LXC container (rather than bolting it onto an existing container) keeps things clean. If Overseerr misbehaves or you want to roll it back to an earlier snapshot, it won't touch Sonarr, Radarr, or your media server.
Prerequisites
Before you start, make sure you have:
- A working Proxmox VE host, version 8.x or newer
- A Plex, Jellyfin, or Emby server already running somewhere on your network
- Sonarr and/or Radarr already installed and working (this guide assumes you've followed our earlier LXC install posts for those)
- Root access to the Proxmox VE web console or SSH access to the host
- At least 8 GB of free storage on whichever Proxmox storage you're deploying the container to, plus 2 GB of RAM to spare
- Basic comfort typing commands in a terminal — you won't need to write anything complicated, just paste and answer prompts
You don't need to know Docker, and you don't need a domain name yet. Both are optional extras you can add later.
Step-by-Step Tutorial
Step 1: Open the Proxmox VE shell
Log in to your Proxmox VE web interface, click your node's name in the left-hand tree (the entry just under "Datacenter"), and click >_ Shell in the top-right corner. This gives you a root terminal running directly on the Proxmox host itself, not inside any VM or container.
Step 2: Run the community-scripts installer
Paste this command into the shell and press Enter:
bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/community-scripts/ProxmoxVE/main/ct/overseerr.sh)"This pulls down the Overseerr installation script maintained by the Proxmox VE Helper-Scripts community project and runs it. It's the same trusted script collection used by thousands of homelab setups, and it's the same one this blog has referenced for Sonarr, Radarr, and the rest of the *Arr stack.
Step 3: Choose default or advanced settings
A blue text menu appears asking whether you want Default Settings or Advanced Settings. For a first install, default is fine. It creates the container with:
- 2 vCPU cores
- 2 GB of RAM
- 8 GB of disk space
- Debian as the base OS, with an unprivileged container by default
If you want a specific container ID, a fixed IP address, or a bridge other than vmbr0, choose Advanced and fill in the prompts. Otherwise just hit Enter and let it run.
Step 4: Wait for the build to finish
The script downloads Debian, creates the container, installs Node.js, and pulls Overseerr itself. On a decent SSD this takes somewhere between three and six minutes. When it's done, you'll see a green summary block with the container's IP address and the URL to reach Overseerr, something like http://192.168.1.50:5055.
Step 5: Open Overseerr and run the setup wizard
Visit that address in your browser. Overseerr's first-run wizard will ask you to sign in — either with your Plex account, or with a local username and password if you're running Jellyfin or Emby instead. Signing in with Plex also lets Overseerr pull your existing library automatically.
Step 6: Connect your media server
On the next screen, add your Plex, Jellyfin, or Emby server. Overseerr will usually auto-detect a Plex server on your local network. For Jellyfin or Emby, you'll need to paste in the server's URL and an API key, which you can generate from that app's admin settings.
Step 7: Connect Sonarr and Radarr
This is the step that actually makes requests download. Go to Settings > Services inside Overseerr and add each one:
- Server Name: whatever you want to call it, e.g. "Radarr - Movies"
- Hostname or IP Address: the LXC container's IP for Radarr or Sonarr
- Port: 7878 for Radarr, 8989 for Sonarr, by default
- API Key: found in Radarr or Sonarr under Settings > General
- Root Folder and Quality Profile: pick whichever you already use for new downloads
Save each one, then run a quick test request from the Overseerr homepage to confirm everything talks to each other.
Step 8: Invite the rest of your household
Under Settings > Users, you can invite people by email (if you've set up notifications) or just hand them the local URL and let them sign in with their own Plex account. You can set request limits per user, and decide whether their requests need your approval or go straight through.
Commands Explained
| Command | What it does |
|---|---|
bash -c "$(curl -fsSL .../overseerr.sh)" | Downloads and immediately runs the Overseerr install script from the community-scripts repository |
pct list | Run on the Proxmox host, lists every LXC container and its current status |
pct enter <ctid> | Drops you into a root shell inside the specified container, replace <ctid> with the container's ID number |
update | Typed inside the Overseerr container's console, this is the community-scripts shortcut that pulls the latest Overseerr version and restarts the service |
systemctl status overseerr | Run inside the container, shows whether the Overseerr service is currently running or has crashed |
Common Errors
A red error badge next to Radarr or Sonarr in Settings > Services, or a message saying the service is unreachable, usually means the API key is wrong, or you typed the container's hostname instead of its IP address. Overseerr can't resolve container hostnames unless you've set up internal DNS, so stick to IP addresses.
Overseerr loads but shows no Plex libraries. This almost always means the Plex account you signed in with doesn't have access to those libraries, or your Plex server hasn't finished its own library scan yet. Give it a few minutes and refresh.
The page won't load at all after install. Double check you're using port 5055 and not 80 or 443. If you still get nothing, the container's firewall (inherited from your Datacenter firewall rules, if you've enabled them) may be blocking the port. Check Datacenter > Firewall and the container's own Firewall tab.
Requests approve but never download. That's not really an Overseerr problem — it means Radarr or Sonarr accepted the request but can't find a matching release. Check the queue and history tabs inside Radarr or Sonarr directly; Overseerr just relays the request, it doesn't do any downloading itself.
Troubleshooting
Start by getting inside the container:
pct enter <ctid>From there, check whether the service is actually alive:
systemctl status overseerrIf it's not running, the logs will tell you why:
journalctl -u overseerr -eMost crashes at this stage are either a corrupted config after a bad update, or the container running out of disk space (unlikely at 8 GB unless you've been storing something else in there). If you suspect a network problem rather than a crash, confirm the port is actually listening:
ss -tulpn | grep 5055And if DNS inside the container seems off — Overseerr can't reach Sonarr, Radarr, or the internet for metadata — test it directly:
ping -c 3 1.1.1.1If that fails, the container's network configuration is the problem, not Overseerr. Check the bridge and IP settings under the container's Hardware and Network tabs in the Proxmox web UI.
Best Practices
Keep Overseerr in its own container rather than squeezing it onto your Sonarr or Radarr box. It's a genuinely small footprint, and the isolation means a bad Overseerr update can't take your download automation down with it.
Don't expose port 5055 directly to the internet. If you want to let family members request titles while they're away from home, put Overseerr behind a reverse proxy (Nginx Proxy Manager or similar) with HTTPS and, ideally, Overseerr's built-in local user accounts rather than relying on Plex alone.
Take a snapshot of the container before running major version updates. It only takes a few seconds and gives you an instant rollback if an update breaks something.
Set request limits early. It's much easier to start everyone at "5 requests per week" and raise it later than to walk back an unlimited policy after your storage fills up.
Honestly, most homelab users never touch the more advanced Overseerr settings like custom notification agents or multiple Radarr instances for 4K vs standard quality. Start simple, add complexity only when you actually feel the need for it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Overseerr free?
Yes. Overseerr is open source and free to self-host. There's no paid tier or subscription.
What's the difference between Overseerr and Jellyseerr?
Jellyseerr is a fork of Overseerr built specifically for Jellyfin users, with tighter Jellyfin integration. Overseerr supports Jellyfin too, but Jellyseerr was built around it from the start. Both projects are merging into "Seerr" over time.
Do I need both Sonarr and Radarr for Overseerr to work?
No. You can connect just Radarr if you only care about movie requests, or just Sonarr for TV shows. Connect both if you want full coverage.
Can I use Overseerr without Plex?
Yes. Jellyfin and Emby are both supported. You'll sign in with a local Overseerr account instead of a Plex account in that case.
How much storage does the Overseerr LXC container actually need?
The default 8 GB is more than enough. Overseerr itself is a lightweight Node.js application and doesn't store your media — just its own database of requests and cached metadata.
Will my existing Sonarr and Radarr settings change when I connect Overseerr?
No. Overseerr only sends new requests through the API. Your existing quality profiles, root folders, and indexers stay exactly as you've configured them.
Conclusion
Once Overseerr is wired up, the difference is immediate. Instead of fielding "can you add this" messages, you get a request sitting in a queue with one click to approve it — or nothing to do at all, if you've let auto-approval handle it. It's a small piece of infrastructure, but it's the one that turns a personal media server into something the whole household can actually use without bothering you.
If you haven't set up Sonarr, Radarr, or a reverse proxy yet, those are worth doing before or right after this. Together they turn a handful of separate tools into something that runs itself.