Headphones Hosting Live In 5 Minutes

Deploy Headphones hosting and keep your music library growing on your own domain. xCloud runs the pinned Headphones 0.6.0 image as a single container, writes a generated username and password into its settings on first start, mounts persistent config, downloads and music volumes and publishes the web interface over HTTPS in minutes. You connect your own downloader and indexer; nothing is bundled.

Deploy your Headphones

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

What is Headphones?

Headphones is an automated music downloader for Usenet and BitTorrent, written in Python. You add the artists you follow, and it watches MusicBrainz for new releases, asks your indexers for them and hands them to your downloader.

Once an album has finished downloading, Headphones renames it, tags it and files it into your music folder. It does not download anything by itself: you connect your own downloader and indexer in its settings.

From Sign-Up to a Running Music Downloader In Just 3 Easy Steps

Self-hosting Headphones normally means a container, a settings file, a sign-in you must remember to switch on, volumes, a domain and a certificate before you can follow your first artist. This is the same result without assembling any of it.

Step 01
Sign Up
Create your xCloud account and pick Headphones from the OneClick catalog. Choose your domain, then set the web interface username, password (generated by default) and timezone.
Step 02
We Deploy It For You
One click. We bring up a single Headphones 0.6.0 container, pinned by immutable digest, write your username and password into its settings, mount the headphones_config, headphones_downloads and headphones_music volumes, and publish the web interface over HTTPS on your domain.
Step 03
Connect A Downloader And Add An Artist
Open your HTTPS Headphones URL and sign in with the saved credentials. Under Settings, connect a downloader and an indexer, then add your first artist from the home page.

Everything Headphones Does, On Your Own Server

Headphones runs in full here: an artist-following music automation tool on your own domain, behind a sign-in from the first start.

Follow Artists
Add the artists you follow and Headphones watches MusicBrainz for new releases. Artist and discography lookup was verified on the install.
Your Downloader, Your Indexers
New releases are requested from the indexers you configure and handed to the downloader you connect, such as SABnzbd, NZBGet, Transmission or qBittorrent.
Renamed, Tagged And Filed
Finished albums are renamed, tagged and filed into a music folder, ready for whatever player reads that folder.
Sign-In From The First Start
Headphones has no sign-in by default. The template writes a generated username and password into its settings, so unauthenticated and wrong-password requests get 401.
Downloads And Music Volumes
Dedicated /downloads and /music volumes come ready, or point them at your own host folders through the Environment editor.
Settings Survive A Restart
Followed artists, settings and the SQLite database live on the headphones_config volume and survived an xCloud Restart in QA.

Everything You Need To Run Your Music Downloader 24/7

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

Headphones 0.6.0 deployed instantly
LinuxServer image pinned by digest
Generated web interface sign-in
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 Headphones

Follow your favourite artists
Add an artist once and let Headphones watch for new releases instead of checking release dates by hand.
Feed the downloader you already run
Hand releases found through your own indexers to SABnzbd, NZBGet, Transmission, qBittorrent or a similar downloader.
Keep a tidy, tagged music folder
Finished albums are renamed, tagged and filed into a music folder, so your library stays consistent without manual sorting.
Run it behind a sign-in from day one
A generated username and password protect the web interface from the first start, so the interface and the downloader and indexer keys inside it are not open to the public.

Headphones Screenshots

Headphones artist search results in the web interface

Headphones home page after an artist has been added

A Headphones artist page listing the artist's albums

Headphones vs Alternatives

Lidarr: Another music collection manager that follows artists and searches your indexers. xCloud also offers it as a OneClick app.
Searching indexers by hand: Without automation, each release is searched for, sent to the downloader and sorted into a folder manually; Headphones does those steps for artists you follow.
Streaming services: A streaming subscription gives you access to someone else's catalogue; Headphones files the albums you obtain through your own indexers and downloader into a music folder you control.

Simple Pricing. Everything Included.

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

Cloud VPS 6 GB

Cloud VPS 16 GB

More headroom if Headphones sits alongside a downloader and other media tools.

$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. Headphones itself is licensed by its maintainers under GPL-3.0-or-later.

Docker hosting

Already Have a Server? Bring Your Own

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

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1 server
10 sites

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The same platform, discounted at 6–10 servers.

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Agency

The same platform, discounted at 11+ servers.

$3per server / month

11+ servers
Unlimited sites
All features included
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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 Downloader?

Headphones 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.

Does Headphones download music by itself?

No. Connect your own downloader and indexer under Settings, then add artists. No downloader or indexer is bundled with this template.

How do I sign in?

Use the web interface username and password from the installation credentials. Headphones has no sign-in of its own by default, so the template writes a generated username and password (HTTP Basic) into its settings on first start; unauthenticated and wrong-password requests get 401 in QA.

Can I change the username and password later?

Yes, but not from the install fields. Those values are used once, on first start. Change the sign-in in Headphones under Settings, Web Interface.

What runs alongside Headphones?

Nothing. It is a single container, and only the web interface is published, through xCloud-managed HTTPS.

Which downloaders can I connect?

Headphones can hand releases to SABnzbd, NZBGet, Transmission, qBittorrent and similar downloaders. The downloader must be able to write to the same download folder, or Headphones cannot pick up finished albums.

Can I use my own music and download folders?

Yes. By default /downloads and /music are empty volumes private to the install. Point them at absolute host folders in the Environment editor, then redeploy.

Edit environment variables

What should I back up?

The headphones_config volume, which holds settings and the SQLite database, while Headphones is quiesced, plus your music library on headphones_music or your own host folder.

Backups in xCloud

Is the Headphones image up to date?

It is the last LinuxServer build, carrying Headphones 0.6.0. LinuxServer has deprecated the image (last build October 2023) and no newer one exists, so keep it behind the sign-in. Update checks and the in-app updater are turned off.

Is the API behind the sign-in?

No. Headphones leaves its /api path outside the sign-in by upstream design, but the API is disabled by default. Enabling it under Settings, Web Interface exposes that path with its own API key only.

Where are my email, indexer and downloader settings?

Only in the Headphones web interface, under Settings. They cannot be set from the Environment editor.

Does xCloud automatically back up or update Headphones?

No. The template pins the LinuxServer image by immutable digest and no newer image exists, so installs are not upgraded. 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, 128 MiB of RAM and 5 GB of disk; measured idle use in QA was about 48 MiB. Library scans and encoding can use more, so this page sells the 6 GB tier as the entry rung, with real headroom above that baseline.

What survives a restart?

Your followed artists, settings and database on the headphones_config volume survived an xCloud Restart in QA, because it is a persistent named volume.

Is xCloud officially partnered with Headphones?

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

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.