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Immich

Immich is a self-hosted photo and video management solution — a privacy-respecting replacement for Google Photos. It offers phone auto-backup, albums, timeline browsing, face/object recognition, and search, all running on hardware you own. Backed by FUTO.

Why it matters for sovereignty

Photos are among the most personal data people hand to a cloud provider. Immich gives the same "phone uploads automatically, browse anywhere" experience without your library living on someone else's servers. A flagship "good first pick" for a nervous self-hoster — the payoff is immediate and tangible. See self-hosting-cost-savings.

Key facts

  • Mobile apps (iOS/Android) with automatic background backup, mirroring the Google Photos UX.
  • Features: albums, shared albums, timeline/map views, ML-powered face & object recognition, search.
  • Runs via docker-compose; multi-container (server, ML, database, Redis) — heavier than a single-container app.
  • Very active open-source project; frequent releases. Historically flagged as pre-1.0 / "breaking changes possible," so pin versions and read release notes before updating.
  • Fronted by caddy for HTTPS like any other service on the box.

What it replaces

Google Photos (~$10/mo for 2TB, more for larger libraries). Cost becomes just your disk + electricity/VPS.