Streama vs Transmission

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted media servers options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

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FeatureStreamaTransmission
CategoryMedia ServersMedia Servers
LicenseMITGPL-3.0
LanguageJavaScriptC++
Setup difficultyMediumMedium
Min. RAM1,024 MB50 MB
Deploymentdocker, bare-metalbare-metal
GitHub stars★ 9,821★ 15,047
First released20152023
ReplacesNetflix, PlexµTorrent

Why pick each one

Choose Streama if…

  • Released under the MIT license
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Mature project with 9.8k GitHub stars
  • Written in JavaScript
Streama details

Choose Transmission if…

  • Released under the GPL-3.0 license
  • Mature project with 15k GitHub stars
  • Written in C++
  • Tiny footprint — runs in 50 MB RAM
Transmission details

Frequently asked questions

Is Streama or Transmission better?

Neither is universally better. Transmission has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.

Are Streama and Transmission free and open-source?

Yes. Streama is licensed under MIT and Transmission under GPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Streama and Transmission with Docker?

Streama: yes. Transmission: check the project docs for container support.

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