How to Install PeerTube on Ubuntu 24.04 — Your Own Federated Video Platform

PeerTube is a free, open-source, federated video streaming platform that puts you back in control of your content. Instead of uploading to YouTube and hoping you do not get demonetized, shadow-banned, or deplatformed overnight, you run your own instance on a VPS you control. Your videos, your rules, your audience. This guide walks you through installing PeerTube on an Ubuntu 24.04 VPS from scratch, including PostgreSQL 16, Redis, FFmpeg, Nginx reverse proxy, Let's Encrypt SSL, live streaming, ActivityPub federation, and optional S3 object storage.

Prefer managed infrastructure? Our Professional VPS plan is sized exactly right for a production PeerTube instance with transcoding, live streams, and room to grow.

Table of Contents

What is PeerTube?

PeerTube is a decentralized, federated video platform developed by Framasoft, a French non-profit. It combines three ideas: a self-hosted video CMS (like YouTube, but you run it), peer-to-peer video delivery via WebTorrent and HLS-over-WebRTC (which reduces bandwidth costs when videos go viral), and ActivityPub federation (so your instance can talk to Mastodon, other PeerTube instances, and the rest of the Fediverse).

The software itself is a Node.js application backed by PostgreSQL and Redis, with FFmpeg handling transcoding. It supports multi-quality adaptive streaming via HLS, live streaming via RTMP/RTMPS with automatic replay generation, channels and playlists, subtitles and captions, a plugin system, and a Single Sign-On flow. Version 6 added video studio features (trim, cut, watermark, intro/outro), object storage offloading to S3-compatible providers, and substantially better moderation tooling.

Because PeerTube speaks ActivityPub, a user on a Mastodon server can follow a PeerTube channel, comment on videos, and share them across the Fediverse. If you already run a Mastodon server, PeerTube is the natural video counterpart.

Why Self-Host a Video Platform?

The case for running your own PeerTube instance instead of depending on YouTube or Vimeo comes down to three things: economics, control, and sovereignty.

• No ads, ever -- Your viewers are not interrupted by pre-rolls, mid-rolls, or banner takeovers. No attention auction sells them to advertisers behind your back. If you choose to run a sponsorship or paid tier, you keep 100 percent of the revenue instead of sharing it with a platform.
• No demonetization, no shadow-banning, no algorithmic suppression -- The single biggest complaint from YouTube creators is that the platform can flip a switch and cut off their income with no warning and no appeal. On PeerTube, there is no algorithm deciding whether your content is "advertiser-friendly." You publish, your subscribers are notified, and they watch.
• Content sovereignty -- Your videos live on disks you control. They are not subject to a Terms of Service that can change overnight, a takedown from a rival's spurious copyright claim, or a platform pivot that buries your back catalog. If PeerTube the project disappeared tomorrow, your instance would keep running.
• Predictable flat-rate cost -- A Professional VPS costs the same whether you serve 100 views or 100,000. P2P delivery (WebTorrent) means viewers help seed popular videos to each other, which further reduces your bandwidth bill when a video goes viral.
• Federation amplifies reach -- Your videos appear on federated timelines across Mastodon and other PeerTube instances. Discovery does not require begging an algorithm -- it requires posting quality content that real people want to share.
• Data privacy for your audience -- No trackers, no fingerprinting, no "also watched" leakage to ad networks. Your viewers' watch history stays on your server.
• Regulatory compliance -- For EU organizations, hosting video in a known EU jurisdiction on infrastructure you control makes GDPR compliance straightforward.

Cost Comparison: Self-Hosted vs. Video SaaS

Prerequisites

Before you begin, make sure you have:

• A VPS running Ubuntu 24.04 LTS with root or sudo access
• A domain name (for example, tube.yourdomain.com) with an A record pointing to the server's IP. Important: The PeerTube domain is permanent -- federation identities are tied to the hostname and cannot be changed later without breaking every follower and comment.
• SSH access to your server
• At least 12 GB RAM, 6 vCPU cores, and 100 GB storage for a usable production instance with transcoding enabled
• SMTP credentials for transactional email (signup confirmations, password resets)

Recommended Plan: Professional

A PeerTube instance with transcoding, live streaming, and 100+ hours of video needs real resources. We recommend the Professional VPS plan:

- 6 vCPU cores

- 12 GB RAM

- 200 GB NVMe SSD

- Unmetered bandwidth

- EUR 19.99/month

For larger libraries and heavy live streaming, combine this plan with S3-compatible object storage and optionally a private WireGuard tunnel between PeerTube and your storage provider.

Connect via SSH to begin:

ssh root@your-server-ip

Step 1: Update the System and Install Dependencies

Start with a clean, fully patched system and install the system libraries PeerTube needs.

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y
sudo apt install -y curl wget gnupg2 ca-certificates lsb-release \
    apt-transport-https software-properties-common unzip git \
    build-essential pkg-config g++ python3 python3-dev \
    openssl nginx cron ufw

Enable the firewall and open the ports PeerTube needs (SSH, HTTP, HTTPS, and RTMP for live streaming):

sudo ufw allow OpenSSH
sudo ufw allow 80/tcp
sudo ufw allow 443/tcp
sudo ufw allow 1935/tcp
sudo ufw enable

Step 2: Install Node 20 and Yarn

PeerTube requires Node 20 LTS. Install it from the NodeSource repository:

curl -fsSL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_20.x | sudo -E bash -
sudo apt install -y nodejs
node --version

Expected output:

v20.18.0

Install Yarn (PeerTube uses Yarn for dependency management and runtime helpers):

sudo npm install -g yarn
yarn --version

Expected output:

1.22.22

Step 3: Install PostgreSQL 16 and Redis

PeerTube stores its metadata, users, channels, and federation state in PostgreSQL. Install the official PostgreSQL 16 repository for the latest stable version:

sudo sh -c 'echo "deb http://apt.postgresql.org/pub/repos/apt $(lsb_release -cs)-pgdg main" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/pgdg.list'
curl -fsSL https://www.postgresql.org/media/keys/ACCC4CF8.asc | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/pgdg.gpg
sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y postgresql-16 postgresql-contrib-16

Start and enable the service:

sudo systemctl enable --now postgresql

Create the PeerTube database user and database. PeerTube expects the unaccent and pg_trgm extensions for search, which is why we enable them explicitly.

sudo -u postgres createuser -P peertube

When prompted, set a strong password and save it -- you will paste it into production.yaml in Step 6.

sudo -u postgres createdb -O peertube -E UTF8 -T template0 peertube_prod
sudo -u postgres psql -c "CREATE EXTENSION pg_trgm;" peertube_prod
sudo -u postgres psql -c "CREATE EXTENSION unaccent;" peertube_prod

Install Redis (PeerTube uses it for session storage, job queues, and caching):

sudo apt install -y redis-server
sudo systemctl enable --now redis-server
redis-cli ping

Expected output:

PONG

Step 4: Install FFmpeg

FFmpeg handles all transcoding -- H.264/H.265 re-encoding, HLS segment generation, thumbnail extraction, and live stream ingest. Install the Ubuntu 24.04 package:

sudo apt install -y ffmpeg
ffmpeg -version | head -n 1

Expected output:

ffmpeg version 6.1.1-3ubuntu5 Copyright (c) 2000-2023 the FFmpeg developers

PeerTube requires FFmpeg 4.3 or later, and Ubuntu 24.04 ships 6.1 -- well above the minimum.

Step 5: Create the peertube User and Clone the App

Running PeerTube as a dedicated non-privileged system user is required for security. Create it with a home directory at /var/www/peertube:

sudo useradd -m -d /var/www/peertube -s /bin/bash peertube
sudo passwd -l peertube

The passwd -l command locks the account -- the peertube user should only ever be reached via sudo -u peertube.

Create the directory layout PeerTube expects:

cd /var/www/peertube
sudo -u peertube mkdir config storage versions

• versions/ -- Contains the checked-out PeerTube release. You keep multiple versions here so rollback is a symlink flip.
• config/ -- Holds production.yaml and related config files. Persists across upgrades.
• storage/ -- Videos, thumbnails, avatars, HLS segments, logs. Persists across upgrades.

VERSION="v6.3.2"
cd /var/www/peertube/versions
sudo -u peertube wget -q "https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/releases/download/${VERSION}/peertube-${VERSION}.zip"
sudo -u peertube unzip -q "peertube-${VERSION}.zip"
sudo -u peertube rm "peertube-${VERSION}.zip"

Create the peertube-latest symlink that systemd will point to:

cd /var/www/peertube
sudo -u peertube ln -s versions/peertube-${VERSION} ./peertube-latest

Install the Node dependencies (this will take 3-5 minutes and compile a few native modules, which is why we installed build-essential earlier):

cd /var/www/peertube/peertube-latest
sudo -u peertube yarn install --production --pure-lockfile

Copy the example configuration files into config/:

cd /var/www/peertube
sudo -u peertube cp peertube-latest/config/default.yaml config/default.yaml
sudo -u peertube cp peertube-latest/config/production.yaml.example config/production.yaml

Step 6: Configure production.yaml

production.yaml is where you wire PeerTube to PostgreSQL, Redis, SMTP, and your domain. Edit it:

sudo -u peertube nano /var/www/peertube/config/production.yaml

Set the values below. Leave everything else at the defaults for now -- you can tune later.

listen:
  hostname: '127.0.0.1'
  port: 9000
webserver:
  https: true
  hostname: 'tube.yourdomain.com'
  port: 443
secrets:
  peertube: 'REPLACE_WITH_openssl_rand_hex_32_OUTPUT'
database:
  hostname: 'localhost'
  port: 5432
  name: 'peertube_prod'
  username: 'peertube'
  password: 'THE_PASSWORD_YOU_SET_IN_STEP_3'
redis:
  hostname: 'localhost'
  port: 6379
smtp:
  transport: smtp
  hostname: 'smtp.yourprovider.com'
  port: 587
  username: '[email protected]'
  password: 'your-smtp-password'
  tls: false
  disable_starttls: false
  from_address: '[email protected]'
admin:
  email: '[email protected]'
storage:
  tmp: '/var/www/peertube/storage/tmp/'
  bin: '/var/www/peertube/storage/bin/'
  avatars: '/var/www/peertube/storage/avatars/'
  videos: '/var/www/peertube/storage/videos/'
  streaming_playlists: '/var/www/peertube/storage/streaming-playlists/'
  redundancy: '/var/www/peertube/storage/redundancy/'
  logs: '/var/www/peertube/storage/logs/'
  previews: '/var/www/peertube/storage/previews/'
  thumbnails: '/var/www/peertube/storage/thumbnails/'
  torrents: '/var/www/peertube/storage/torrents/'
  captions: '/var/www/peertube/storage/captions/'
  cache: '/var/www/peertube/storage/cache/'
  plugins: '/var/www/peertube/storage/plugins/'
transcoding:
  enabled: true
  threads: 2
  concurrency: 1
  resolutions:
    '0p': false
    '144p': false
    '240p': true
    '360p': true
    '480p': true
    '720p': true
    '1080p': true
    '1440p': false
    '2160p': false

Generate a cryptographically strong secret for the secrets.peertube field:

openssl rand -hex 32

Paste the output into the secrets.peertube line.

A few notes on the values above:

• webserver.hostname is permanent. This value becomes part of every federated video identifier (https://tube.yourdomain.com/videos/watch/<uuid>). Changing it later breaks federation -- all remote follows and shares go stale.
• transcoding.threads: 2 and concurrency: 1 are tuned for a 6 vCPU VPS. Raise concurrency only on larger servers; transcoding will saturate all available cores otherwise.
• The lowest resolutions (0p, 144p) are disabled because most modern clients reject them. 1440p and 2160p are disabled because they multiply storage cost -- enable them later if your audience needs 4K.

Step 7: Create the systemd Service

Install the systemd unit that ships with PeerTube:

sudo cp /var/www/peertube/peertube-latest/support/systemd/peertube.service /etc/systemd/system/peertube.service

Inspect and adjust the unit if needed:

sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/peertube.service

The defaults are sensible for Ubuntu 24.04. Confirm that User=peertube, WorkingDirectory=/var/www/peertube/peertube-latest, and ExecStart invokes Node with the peertube-latest binary. Save and exit.

Enable and start the service:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now peertube
sudo systemctl status peertube

Expected output:

● peertube.service - PeerTube daemon
     Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/peertube.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Thu 2026-04-16 12:00:00 UTC; 10s ago
   Main PID: 23456 (node)
      Tasks: 18 (limit: 14236)
     Memory: 312.0M

Watch the startup logs for any configuration errors:

sudo journalctl -u peertube -f

PeerTube logs its HTTP listener and migration status. Once you see Server listening on 127.0.0.1:9000, the backend is up.

Step 8: Configure Nginx Reverse Proxy

PeerTube ships a hardened, tuned Nginx configuration at support/nginx/peertube inside the release tarball. Use it -- do not hand-roll your own, because PeerTube's HLS streaming, WebSocket signaling, and large upload handling all require specific proxy_* tuning.

Copy the provided template to sites-available:

sudo cp /var/www/peertube/peertube-latest/support/nginx/peertube /etc/nginx/sites-available/peertube

Substitute your domain into the config:

sudo sed -i 's/${WEBSERVER_HOST}/tube.yourdomain.com/g' /etc/nginx/sites-available/peertube
sudo sed -i 's/${PEERTUBE_HOST}/127.0.0.1:9000/g' /etc/nginx/sites-available/peertube

Enable the site and disable the default placeholder:

sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/peertube /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/peertube
sudo rm -f /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default

The PeerTube-provided config includes:

• An HTTP-to-HTTPS redirect on port 80
• HSTS and security headers
• A client_max_body_size 12G directive (so users can upload large videos)
• Long proxy_read_timeout for live stream and upload connections
• Correct MIME handling for HLS .m3u8 playlists and .ts segments
• WebSocket upgrade for federation and live chat
• A dedicated location /static/streaming-playlists/ block that serves HLS directly from disk without proxying through Node (major performance win)

sudo nginx -t
sudo systemctl reload nginx

Step 9: Obtain SSL with Certbot

PeerTube cannot federate over plain HTTP -- the ActivityPub spec requires HTTPS. Install Certbot and request a Let's Encrypt certificate:

sudo apt install -y certbot python3-certbot-nginx
sudo certbot --nginx -d tube.yourdomain.com

Follow the prompts (enter an email address, accept the TOS). Certbot automatically rewrites the Nginx config to reference the new certificate and sets up a renewal timer.

Verify automatic renewal works:

sudo certbot renew --dry-run

Expected output includes:

Congratulations, all simulated renewals succeeded

Reload Nginx one final time and open the site in a browser at https://tube.yourdomain.com. You should see the PeerTube welcome page.

Step 10: Create the Admin User

The initial admin password is generated on first boot and printed to the logs. Retrieve it:

sudo journalctl -u peertube --no-pager | grep -i "Username: root" -A 1

Expected output:

Username: root
User password: 1a2b3c4d5e6f7g8h

Visit https://tube.yourdomain.com/login, sign in as root with that password, and immediately change it under My Settings > Account settings.

Next, run through the initial admin configuration at /admin/config:

• Instance name and description (what appears on your homepage and in federation discovery)
• Terms, Code of Conduct, Moderation information (linked from the footer)
• Signup policy -- open, request-based, or invite-only
• Default user video quota -- how much each new user can upload (e.g., 10 GB)
• Default channels quota per user -- usually 20

Step 11: Enable Live Streaming

PeerTube's live streaming accepts RTMP ingest (the same protocol OBS and Streamlabs use) and outputs adaptive HLS to viewers. It also supports automatic replay -- when your stream ends, PeerTube saves a VOD and publishes it to the channel.

Enable it in production.yaml:

live:
  enabled: true
  allow_replay: true
  max_duration: -1
  max_instance_lives: 20
  max_user_lives: 3
  transcoding:
    enabled: true
    threads: 2
    profile: default
    resolutions:
      '240p': false
      '360p': true
      '480p': true
      '720p': true
      '1080p': true

Then restart PeerTube:

sudo systemctl restart peertube

PeerTube listens for RTMP on port 1935 (which you opened in Step 1). In OBS, set:

• Server: rtmp://tube.yourdomain.com:1935/live
• Stream Key: (generate one in the PeerTube UI under Publish > Go live > Create a permanent live stream)

For RTMPS (encrypted ingest), add a rtmps section with a certificate. For most use cases, plain RTMP with a rotating stream key is fine -- the public playback side is already HTTPS.

Step 12: Federation with the Fediverse

PeerTube federates over ActivityPub by default -- you do not have to do anything extra. Every video you publish is broadcast as a federated Announce activity to followers of your channel. Users on Mastodon, Misskey, Pleroma, and other PeerTube instances can follow @[email protected] and see your videos in their home feed.

To accelerate discovery, take a few concrete actions:

Federation identities are permanent. If you rename your domain later, every remote follower's subscription breaks -- this is why we emphasized the domain choice in Step 6.

If you also host a Mastodon instance, the two integrate transparently: boost a PeerTube video from Mastodon and it renders inline with a playable embed.

Step 13: Offload Storage to S3 (Optional)

Video files are large. A 100-hour library at 1080p easily exceeds 500 GB. Rather than growing your VPS's attached disk indefinitely, PeerTube v5+ supports offloading videos, HLS playlists, and user avatars to any S3-compatible object storage provider -- AWS S3, Backblaze B2, Wasabi, Hetzner Object Storage, or your own MinIO instance.

Add an object_storage section to production.yaml:

object_storage:
  enabled: true
  endpoint: 'https://s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com'
  region: 'eu-central-1'
  credentials:
    access_key_id: 'YOUR_S3_ACCESS_KEY'
    secret_access_key: 'YOUR_S3_SECRET_KEY'
  max_upload_part: 100MB
  streaming_playlists:
    bucket_name: 'peertube-streaming-playlists'
    prefix: ''
    base_url: 'https://peertube-streaming-playlists.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com'
  web_videos:
    bucket_name: 'peertube-web-videos'
    prefix: ''
    base_url: 'https://peertube-web-videos.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com'
  user_exports:
    bucket_name: 'peertube-user-exports'
    prefix: ''
  original_video_files:
    bucket_name: 'peertube-original-videos'
    prefix: ''

Create the buckets in your S3 provider and ensure they have CORS configured to allow GET, HEAD from your PeerTube domain. Restart the service:

sudo systemctl restart peertube

Existing videos stay on local disk. To migrate them in bulk, use the built-in CLI:

cd /var/www/peertube/peertube-latest
sudo -u peertube NODE_CONFIG_DIR=/var/www/peertube/config \
    NODE_ENV=production node dist/scripts/migrate-to-object-storage.js

After migration, your VPS disk only holds configs, database files, and temporary transcoding workspace -- typically under 30 GB even for a busy instance.

Troubleshooting

Viewing Logs

The Node process logs go through systemd:

sudo journalctl -u peertube -f

Application-level logs (with more detail) are written to /var/www/peertube/storage/logs/peertube.log:

sudo -u peertube tail -f /var/www/peertube/storage/logs/peertube.log

For complete configuration reference and advanced tuning, see the official docs at docs.joinpeertube.org.

FAQ

How much bandwidth does PeerTube actually use?

Outbound bandwidth scales with viewer count and video quality. A 1080p stream pushes roughly 4-6 Mbps per viewer via HLS. However, PeerTube's WebTorrent and HLS-over-WebRTC layers let viewers seed segments to each other -- when a video is being watched simultaneously by multiple people, peer-to-peer delivery can reduce server egress by 30-60 percent. For a small creator instance, the unmetered bandwidth on a Professional VPS is more than enough. For heavy traffic, pair PeerTube with S3 plus a CDN in front of your object storage bucket.

How much storage do I need?

Plan for roughly 1 GB per hour of uploaded 1080p video per enabled transcoding resolution. If you upload 10 hours of 1080p originals with 360p/480p/720p/1080p transcoding enabled, that is approximately 40 GB. The Professional VPS's 200 GB NVMe holds around 50 hours of video in that configuration before you should enable S3 offloading. With S3, the VPS disk only needs to hold temporary transcoding workspace (around 20 GB).

Can PeerTube handle live streaming at scale?

Yes, but with caveats. A single VPS transcoding one live stream into 4 resolutions uses about 4-6 vCPU cores and 4 GB RAM during the broadcast. A 6 vCPU Professional plan comfortably handles 1-2 concurrent live streams. For more simultaneous broadcasters, scale up vertically or move transcoding to a dedicated worker node. Viewer count is bandwidth-limited, not CPU-limited, because HLS playback is just file serving.

How does PeerTube compare to Odysee, Rumble, and Vimeo?

Odysee and Rumble are centralized YouTube alternatives that you still do not control. They can demonetize, ban, or deplatform you just like YouTube. Vimeo is a SaaS video hosting product that charges per-storage and per-bandwidth with no federation. PeerTube is the only option where the infrastructure is yours -- the software is AGPL-licensed, federates natively, and runs on hardware you pay for directly. The trade-off is operational: you maintain the server, you handle moderation, you respond to abuse reports. For creators who value sovereignty over convenience, PeerTube wins.

Can I migrate my existing YouTube channel to PeerTube?

Yes. PeerTube ships an import feature that accepts any URL supported by yt-dlp -- which includes YouTube, Vimeo, Twitch, and dozens of others. In the admin config, enable Video imports > HTTP imports and Video imports > Torrent imports, then users can paste a YouTube URL into the upload form and PeerTube will download, transcode, and publish it as a native video. For bulk migration, use the CLI: sudo -u peertube node dist/scripts/import-videos.js -u https://youtube.com/@yourchannel.

Is PeerTube legally safe to run?

You are responsible for the content on your instance under the laws of your hosting jurisdiction. PeerTube gives you strong moderation tools: per-video and per-user suspension, federation blocklists, NSFW flags, comment policies, and abuse reports with audit trails. Publish clear Terms of Service and a moderation policy, respond promptly to DMCA and content takedown requests, and keep logs. For EU-hosted instances, the Digital Services Act requires a designated legal contact and transparency reporting -- both are straightforward for small instances but something to plan for before launch.

How do I keep PeerTube updated?

Upgrades follow the same pattern as the initial install: download the new release tarball into versions/, re-point the peertube-latest symlink, run yarn install --production --pure-lockfile, and restart the service. PeerTube runs database migrations automatically on startup. Always read the release notes before upgrading major versions -- occasional breaking changes require config adjustments. The official upgrade script at support/doc/production.md#upgrade-recommended automates the entire flow.

Next Steps

With PeerTube live on your VPS, here are the natural follow-ons:

• Set up automated backups -- Back up the config/ directory, the PostgreSQL database (pg_dump peertube_prod), and if not using S3, the storage/ directory. A weekly offsite backup with restic or borgbackup protects against disk failure and human error.
• Install a Mastodon server -- Pair your PeerTube instance with a Mastodon instance on a second VPS. Boost your videos, run polls, and build an audience across both platforms with federation handling cross-posting for free.
• Deploy MinIO for self-hosted S3 -- Rather than paying AWS or Backblaze, run your own S3-compatible object storage on a separate storage-optimized VPS and connect PeerTube to it. Keeps all your data on infrastructure you control.
• Secure admin access with WireGuard -- Restrict /admin/* in Nginx to a private WireGuard subnet so the admin panel is never exposed to the public internet. Combine with SSH-key-only access for defense in depth.
• Install plugins -- Browse the official plugin index at packages.joinpeertube.org for auto-captioning (Whisper), custom themes, authentication integrations (OIDC, SAML), and chat/live interaction plugins.

Run PeerTube on Infrastructure Sized for It

A serious video platform needs serious hardware. Our Professional VPS gives you the vCPUs, RAM, and NVMe storage to transcode, stream live, and federate -- without noisy-neighbor throttling.

- 6 vCPU cores for parallel transcoding

- 12 GB RAM for Node, Postgres, and Redis in harmony

- 200 GB NVMe for a few hundred hours of video

- Unmetered bandwidth so viral videos do not bankrupt you

- 24/7 support from engineers who actually run PeerTube

Deploy Your PeerTube VPS Now -- Plans start at EUR 19.99/month.