Setting up a Private Immich Server

Install Docker Compose

Docker Compose has packages available for Ubuntu, Debian, RHEL & Fedora, and instructions can be found in the Docker Docs. I however use Arch Linux for my server, but luckily there is an unsupported package in pacman.

1. Install docker and docker-compose.

sudo pacman -Syu docker docker-compose

2. Start the systemctl process to make sure Docker Compose is always running.

sudo systemctl enable  --now docker.service

3. This can be verified with:

docker compose version

Install Immich

1. Use the Immich website's documentation for installing and running with Docker Compose; once again, this documentation is more than good enough.

Configure Immich

1. Visit port 2283 on the machine that Immich was installed on: http://SERVER.IP.ADDRESS:2283.
2. Follow the prompts to set up an admin & some user accounts & use Immich's documentation if stuck.
3. There are a few different ways to remotely access an Immich server, but one of the easiest & most secure is via a VPN - just do that unless there's a really good reason not to.

Backups

The Immich application is very wise to scream at users the moment they login about setting up a 3-2-1 backup solution. This documentation does not cover the back-up of an Immich library, but I have created separate documentation that does. I would highly recommend backing up anything and everything you self-host to the best of your ability. Even if a proper off-site back-up is not something that is financially feasible, just having a copy on two machines rather than one is enough to find a way to restore, should the worst happen.