Explo Hosting Live In 5 Minutes

Deploy Explo hosting and get a self-hosted alternative to Spotify's Discover Weekly for your own music library. xCloud runs the pinned Explo v1.2.0 image, generates the web sign-in, mounts persistent volumes for your settings and downloaded tracks, and publishes the interface over HTTPS in minutes. Explo turns your ListenBrainz recommendations into playlists on the music server you already run.

Deploy your Explo

No terminal
No technical skills needed
No lock-in, cancel anytime

What is Explo?

Explo is an open-source music discovery companion. It reads your ListenBrainz recommendations (Weekly Exploration, Weekly Jams, Daily Jams and custom playlists), finds the tracks, downloads them and creates a playlist on your own music server.

Explo is not a music server or a player. It needs an existing Jellyfin, Navidrome or other Subsonic server, Plex, Emby or MPD that your xCloud server can reach, plus a ListenBrainz account.

From Sign-Up to Weekly Playlists In Just 3 Easy Steps

Running Explo yourself means a container, a pinned image, a sign-in, two volumes, a domain and a certificate before the first playlist. This is the same result without assembling any of it.

Step 01
Sign Up
Create your xCloud account and pick Explo from the OneClick catalog. Choose your domain, then set the web UI username (default admin) and a password, or leave the password empty to have one generated.
Step 02
We Deploy It For You
One click. We bring up the official Explo image, pinned by immutable digest, mount the explo_config and explo_data volumes, and publish the web interface over HTTPS on your domain. Allow one to two minutes after the first start while Explo updates its YouTube downloader.
Step 03
Run The Setup Wizard
Open your HTTPS Explo URL and sign in with the credentials shown after install. Then complete the wizard: your ListenBrainz username and token, followed by the address and credentials of your music server.

Everything Explo Does, On Your Own Server

Explo runs in full here: a web interface that builds playlists from your ListenBrainz recommendations and writes them to the music server you already use.

ListenBrainz Playlists
Weekly Exploration, Weekly Jams and Daily Jams from ListenBrainz become playlists in your music library.
Your Music Server
Works with Jellyfin, Navidrome and other Subsonic servers, Plex, Emby and MPD. Explo is a companion, not a player.
Setup Wizard And Scheduling
A web interface with a setup wizard and scheduling, so playlists refresh without a command line.
Custom Playlist Import
Import your own playlists from ListenBrainz, Spotify or Apple Music.
Downloaders
Tracks are fetched via YouTube, with Lidarr and Soulseek available as alternative downloaders.
Persistent Settings And Tracks
Wizard settings, cached data and downloaded tracks live in named volumes and were still there after an xCloud Restart in QA.

Everything You Need To Run Your Music Discovery 24/7

Managed hosting for Explo, so the parts that keep it online are not your problem.

Explo v1.2.0 deployed instantly
Official image pinned by digest
Web sign-in generated for you
Kept behind xCloud nginx
Free SSL certificate
Server backups and snapshots
Server security updates included
30+ server locations
Unused balance refunded

What You Can Do With Explo

A Weekly Playlist Without Spotify
Get new music suggestions every week as a playlist inside the library you already own, instead of in a streaming service.
Daily Listening Refresh
Let Daily Jams from ListenBrainz land in Jellyfin, Navidrome or Plex on a schedule you set in the web interface.
Bring Existing Playlists Home
Import custom playlists from ListenBrainz, Spotify or Apple Music and have Explo build them on your music server.
Discovery For A Home Music Server
Keep a household Navidrome or Jellyfin library growing with recommendations based on what you actually listen to.

Explo Screenshots

Explo vs Alternatives

Spotify Discover Weekly: A weekly playlist inside Spotify's streaming service. Explo builds the equivalent from your ListenBrainz recommendations on a music server you run yourself.
ListenBrainz alone: ListenBrainz generates the recommendations. Explo is the part that downloads the tracks and creates the playlists on your music server.
Lidarr: Explo can use Lidarr as an alternative downloader to YouTube, so the two can work together.

Simple Pricing. Everything Included.

Dedicated Cloud VPS sizes, pre-configured for Explo hosting. Pick the one that fits, and resize any time.

Cloud VPS 6 GB

Cloud VPS 16 GB

More headroom if Explo sits alongside a music server and other media apps.

$59.99per month

16 GB RAM
6 vCPU cores
200 GB NVMe SSD
30 TB
Unlimited

Get started

Every size is a dedicated Cloud VPS we provision, patch, monitor and restore. Billed monthly with no lock-in — delete the server and the unused balance comes back to your account. Explo itself is licensed by its maintainers under the MIT license.

Docker hosting

Already Have a Server? Bring Your Own

Connect any VPS — DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, AWS, Hetzner or bare metal — and deploy Explo on it through the same panel, for a per-server management fee instead of a Cloud VPS rental.

Free

Start your journey without cost.

$0forever

1 server
10 sites

Start free

Starter

Professional

The same platform, discounted at 6–10 servers.

$4per server / month

6–10 servers
Unlimited sites
All features included
Bring any VPS provider

Get started

Agency

The same platform, discounted at 11+ servers.

$3per server / month

11+ servers
Unlimited sites
All features included
Bring any VPS provider

Get started

Priced per connected server, so your rate adjusts automatically as you add or remove servers. You pay your own provider for the server itself.

Self-managed hosting

Ready To Run Your Own Music Discovery?

Explo on xCloud runs on a dedicated Cloud VPS that we provision, patch, monitor and restore. Deploy faster. Own the server. Stay in control.

Fast Provisioning
Deploy faster using an xCloud Managed Server built with optimized stacks and high-speed SSDs.
Enterprise-grade security
Protect your infrastructure with a free SSL certificate and more advanced security features at no additional cost.
Intuitive Control Panel
From Server creation to application deployment, everything can be managed from our intuitive control panel.

Hear what people are saying about us

See why agencies, developers, startups, and growing businesses choose xCloud to power their projects.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Feel free to contact us with any questions or concerns you may have.

Do I need a music server?

Yes. Explo is a companion, not a player. It needs Jellyfin, Navidrome, Plex, Emby, MPD or another Subsonic server that your xCloud server can reach.

How do I sign in?

Use the username (default admin) and the generated password shown in the installation credentials, then run the setup wizard with your ListenBrainz username and token and your music server's address and credentials.

Why is the page slow to answer after a deploy or restart?

On every start Explo updates its YouTube downloader first, so the web interface can take one to two minutes to answer after the first deploy and after each restart.

Do I need a ListenBrainz token?

A ListenBrainz token is needed for private, personalized data. Public users' playlists were pulled without one in QA.

Where do downloaded tracks go, and can my music server play them?

Tracks are written to the explo_data volume at /data. Your music server can only play them if it reads the same folder: set EXPLO_LIBRARY in the Environment editor to a shared absolute path on the server and redeploy.

Edit environment variables and redeploy

Who can reach the interface, and how do I protect it?

Anyone who can open the URL sees the sign-in page, and once signed in a user can read and change the saved music server credentials and trigger downloads. Keep the password strong and optionally add Basic Auth at your access layer. Never clear both UI credentials: Explo then disables authentication.

What should I back up?

The explo_config volume (wizard settings, playlist cache, cover art and custom playlists), and explo_data if downloads are kept there.

Backups in xCloud

What survives a restart?

Both volumes are persistent. In QA the configuration and 47 downloaded tracks were still present after an xCloud Restart. Sessions are kept in memory, so a restart signs you out.

Does xCloud automatically back up or update Explo?

No. The template pins Explo v1.2.0 by immutable digest; new installations use the pinned release and existing sites are not automatically upgraded. Back up first, read the upstream release notes, then bump the readable tag and digest together on your own schedule. Server-level backups and snapshots are available on every Cloud VPS.

What are the server requirements, and why does this page sell 6 GB?

The template's baseline asks for 1 CPU core, 512 MB of RAM and 4 GB of disk; measured use in QA was about 17 MiB idle and about 66 MiB after a playlist run. This page sells the 6 GB tier as the entry rung, with ample headroom above that baseline.

Is xCloud officially partnered with Explo?

No. No official partnership or endorsement between xCloud and the Explo project has been verified. This is a deployment and server-management option for the open-source Explo project, which is MIT licensed.

Can I cancel anytime?

Yes. There is no lock-in — cancel any time. Hosting is billed monthly and charged for what you actually use, so when you delete the server the unused balance is refunded to your account, less up to 10% in payment-processing fees.