Sonarr
TAS Score: S3/3 — D5/5 — A3 / T2
Brief Description
Automated TV series collection manager. Monitors for new episodes, searches indexers, downloads, and organizes your TV library. Handles season packs, quality upgrades, and proper naming. Part of the *arr stack ecosystem.
Architectural Role
Applications/media layer: the automated librarian for TV shows. Same architecture as Radarr but for series — monitors air dates, grabs episodes, renames, and sorts into season folders for your media server.
Technical Autonomy
- ✅ Works without internet (manages existing library offline)
- ✅ Stores data locally (SQLite database, config)
- ✅ Does not require external accounts
- ✅ Allows data export (database backup, API access)
- ⚠️ Needs internet to search indexers and fetch TV metadata
Philosophical Assessment (whose.world criteria)
| Criterion | Status | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| Pause | ✅ | Stop container, library stays. Missed episodes queue when resumed. |
| Exit | ✅ | Media files are standard video files. Config is SQLite. |
| Recoverability | ✅ | Backup SQLite database. Media files are independent. |
| Visibility | ✅ | GPL-3.0, fully auditable. |
| External Dependencies | ✅ | Self-hosted. TheTVDB/TMDB metadata lookups are optional. |
Configuration (Minimal)
services:
sonarr:
image: linuxserver/sonarr
container_name: sonarr
ports:
- "8989:8989"
volumes:
- ./config/sonarr:/config
- /path/to/tv:/tv
- /path/to/downloads:/downloads
environment:
- TZ=UTC
restart: unless-stopped
Related Recipes
- Media Server recipe (planned)
Alternatives
| Alternative | Autonomy | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| SickChill | A3 / T2 | Older alternative. Less maintained. |
| Medusa | A3 / T2 | Fork of SickRage. Less polished than Sonarr. |
Trajectory
Direction: stable.
One of the original *arr applications. Actively maintained since 2014. GPL-3.0, community-driven, regular releases.
Signal assessment:
| Signal | Status | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| License | ✅ | GPL-3.0, unchanged. |
| Feature gating | ✅ | No paid tier. |
| Self-hosting | ✅ | Docker-first, extensive wiki. |
| Governance | ✅ | Community-driven, multiple maintainers. |
Signal key: ✅ opening · ➖ neutral · ⚠️ closing
Sources
- Website: sonarr.tv
- Repository: github.com/Sonarr/Sonarr
- Docker image:
linuxserver/sonarr