My Ridiculously Robust Photo Management System (Immich Edition)
by jmathai on 1/28/2026, 1:17:56 PM
https://jaisenmathai.com/articles/my-ridiculously-robust-photo-management-system-immich-edition/
Comments
by: shantara
I migrated from Apple Photos to Immich a couple of months ago, removing the iCloud subscription, and couldn’t be happier. It was the most hassle free piece of self-hosted software I’ve had so far. Very easy to install and everything just works. Context and OCR search are amazing. Mobile apps could be better, but they are constantly being improved.<p>My favorite feature is being able to setup a container on my Linux desktop that has a GPU access and can run ML workloads for image processing whenever I turn the computer on, as my NAS (where Immich resides) is a low power machine without a dedicated GPU. They even have ROCM support, so it works even without an Nvidia GPU. Being able to spread such workloads over your local network feels like a magic that has been forgotten in an era of blackbox cloud providers.
1/31/2026, 9:58:53 AM
by: jacomoRodriguez
Habe you tried nextcloud + memories app? Every metadata is stored in EXIF and the directory structure on disk defines the directory structure in the app (and vice versa). When you want to move your tooling or just do things manual again, grab the disk and your are ready.
1/31/2026, 9:35:23 AM
by: savolai
Elodie makes a copy of all my images initially? Is the recommenddd route then to delete the files in original location? Seems unclear at first read.
1/31/2026, 9:07:39 AM
by: dgxyz
After going through 25 years of changing software every few years on this front I can’t be bothered. Files on disk. Nothing over the top. Immich is just another thing to maintain. Another problem which will result in a wholesale migration down the line.<p>If someone wants something I email it to them or upload it to a directory on a web server and send them the link. If I want something on my phone I’ll zap it over with localsend.<p>Photography is a hobby for me and I have a large family so I have a lot of photos. And a lot of editing to do. Currently moving from Lightroom to Darktable because again Lightroom tries to hammer me with library management and lock me into things.
1/31/2026, 8:57:23 AM