I use Jellyfin. You can find a very easy to deploy docker container by linuxserver.io team. Jellyfin has dedicated music only apps as well, for phones as desktops.

I use a Plex server and the PlexAmp app wherever I want to listen. There are probably better options, but it's something I set up years ago which was dead simple and requires almost no maintenance.

Symphonium is a great Android music player which connects to a Subsonic or Jellyfin server (or any other protocol like SMB).

Navidrome is a music server which implements the Subsonic protocol. This means apps like Symphonium can connect to it.

Any old PC is enough, even a Raspberry Pi is fast enough for a music server.

1. Install Navidrome on the server/pc
2. Configure Navidrome (open ports, add your music library/folder)
3. Connect a subsonic-compatible music app to to the server (I.e. type in IP or domain as well as the port).

Anything more like SSL (https) and a domain is optional for getting it working, and only a benefit if used outside of your home network. Using Tailscale makes a domain/SSL unnecessary and also no longer needs messing around with networking (e.g. no opening ports on the router).

I'm going to go another route here: do you need streaming?

Like, I've simply gone with a giant pile of FLACs that I put on a SD card for my phone, and use over the NAS for when I'm at home and don't currently use any fancy-pants streaming stuff.

So like, depending on how you're using your music library, you might not even need to drop deep into the giant self-hosting rabbithole for this.

What I've been doing:

Easy option: because I only have around 40gb of music, I sync it between my PC and my phone using syncthing since 128gb is the minimum nowadays

Hard option: streaming is cooler so I installed nextcloud with an optional plugin called "music" which allows to connect an app called "ultramusic" and it becomes "self hosted Spotify" with android auto support and all the bells and whistles. Disadvantage: Nextcloud is a moving target. For some reason they have to release new incompatible versions every two or three months. So for plugin developers this is a very annoying upgrade threadmill that eventually leads to burnout and that plugin dies. Even officially supported plugins sometimes don't support the latest version when they launch it. If you choose to use nextcloud with docker, make sure to stay behind 1-2 versions (tag nextcloud:28 when nextcloud:30 is released) or your plugins might suddenly break without any warning. According to fanboys this is the industry standard nowadays and it's up to the user to manually check the GitHub issues of each of the 30 plugins if it's compatible before updating. Even if it's official plugin. They call it "stable" but they mean "beta testing for the paid enterprise version".

There are lots of solutions, but as others have noted, Plex with Plexamp is great.

I’d recommend getting a NAS for storage and running mirrored disks. This way you’ve got some redundancy in the event of a disk failure.

There are many different ways, but personally (and hopefully I don't get crucified for saying this) I use Plex and Plexamp. Plexamp has got to be the best music app I've ever used. I even tied it into Last.fm to get recommendations for new music based on my listening.

You'd need to set up Plex media server to go this route: https://support.plex.tv/articles/200264746-quick-start-step-by-step-guides/

Personally I host via Docker.

It might be a little overkill if you don't have other media, though, and it's not fully open source.

Plex is good and the Plexamp app for music is excellent.

Skimmed comments, but if you download and manage your music on your own on a machine you can have a super simple setup like I do. All music is synced using Syncthing to my phone. So my phone gets local storage, and then I use Poweramp (android) to play it.

I pretty much have a folder for all the music though. But I assume you can sort music into folders to have them as playlists. But perhaps not as practical as desired.

Jellyfin + Finamp has been pretty good for me.

however, i know nothing about self hosting. My knowledge is absolutely zero [...] I dont understand nothing

This is going to be a problem, unfortunately. You'll need to define your use case first:

• How much music do you want to have access to? Hundreds, thousands, millions of files? How large is your collection?
• Do you have downloaded copies of all the music you want to listen to? Are they all in one place, well organized and tagged? If you just have downloads in the Spotify app, you won't be able to use those files, you don't actually own that music. You'll need DRM-free audio files.
• Where and how do you want to be able to access them? Just from one device like your phone? Many devices? Is having access at home good enough, or do you want to be able to access your collection while you're away from home?
• Will you be the only user?
• What kind of budget do you have to work with?

An old PC might be enough to act as a server, but there's more involved and the answer to what you need depends on what exactly you want to do. You will not be able to build a personal version of Spotify with just an old PC, for instance.

Music assistant on home assistant or without HA will let you host your own music but also allow for the addition of streaming providers. It lets you cast your collection to pretty much any speakers. You can even build your own cast receivers with any android device and squeeze cast.

https://music-assistant.io/

So, self hosting is complicated. Everyone in this comment section has had tons of experience with it. I tried Plex, failed. Jellyfin, didn't connect. Entire OSes on a raspberry pi, didn't work.

I don't know your situation but for me giving up and just keeping it stored on my phone and manually updating is good enough.