I purchased the original Umbrel Home in May 2024 and it’s been running in my office ever since it arrived. There have been a number of updates since then and my usage and appreciation for it has only grown.

What I Use it For

I have nearly twenty applications running on my Umbrel. And, obviously, some get more use than others. Here are a handful of the most crucial to my workflows:

• FreshRSS — This is the backbone of my RSS system. I use FreshRSS several times each day, syncing with NetNewsWireon my Apple devices, Fluent Reader on Android, and Newsflash on Linux.
• Gitea — Although I don’t work with it too often, this is where the code lives for a handful of my projects.
• Heimdall — The homepage software I use. I have a page set up for my home server links and I also have a page configured with links to work-related tools.
• Linkwarden — I’ve tried a number of solutions for saving links for later and Linkwarden is by far my favorite. I have some complaints about the mobile app, but they’re all pretty minor. The key is that this is one of the most important apps I run on Umbrel. Every single link I publish on Initial Charge is first saved to Linkwarden.
• MeTube — An excellent tool for downloading videos from YouTube. It even offers the option to subscribe to channels or playlists that the service will check regularly and automatically download new videos that have been added. When I interact with YouTube now, more often than not it’s through MeTube.
• n8n — This is a relatively new application on this list. It’s an automation tool similar to IFTTT or Zapier. But it’s entirely self-hosted. Because of this tool, I was able to cancel my IFTTT Pro plan and save myself about $35 a year.
• Vaultwarden — An excellent password manager that we sync with the official Bitwarden apps on iOS, macOS, Linux, and the browser extension in Brave.

Do My Issues Still Stand?

Back when I wrote my initial review I had a handful of issues that cropped up during my time with it. I thought I’d revisit those to see if they are still problems I’m experiencing or if they were bugs that have since been fixed.

I’ve run into occasional SSL errors with my Lightning Node. The fix is relatively simple, but requires using SSH or the system’s built-in command line interface.

I haven’t experienced this problem again. The forum thread I referenced hasn’t had a new message since April 2024, so it seems this was fixed in a subsequent release of the Lightning Node app or UmbrelOS.

The Bitcoin Node has randomly dropped to zero peers and stops updating. Restarting the app hasn’t resolved the issue for me and I end up having to reboot the entire system.

This is another problem that I haven’t experienced in quite a long time.

Speaking of rebooting, the first time I tried using the “Restart” option from within the web interface, the reboot never completed. I waited for several minutes and eventually used the power button to force the shutdown. Since then I’ve only used the “Shutdown” option in the web interface and then started it back up using the power button on the front. That method has been far more consistent for me.

The Umbrel Home is connected to an uninterruptible power supply and I can probably count on one hand the number of times I’ve had to reboot it over the past year. But I can’t say I’ve run into this issue again. I completely forgot that I was having trouble with it at all.

I’ve had instances where the Umbrel becomes randomly inaccessible from some of the computers on my network.

I haven’t experienced this lately either and I seem to remember it disappearing not too long after publishing my review.

There’s been a couple of times where my two-factor authentication codes didn’t work for logging in. I had to disable the feature from another system where I was already logged in. I can’t say for certain whether this was an Umbrel issue or something wrong with 1Password, though.

This would have been a serious issue if it persisted, but it didn’t. I’m still not sure if it was related to 1Password or Umbrel, but the problem did disappear at some point.

Any New Issues or Annoyances?

I haven’t run into any bugs in quite a while. The operating system itself has felt rock solid for nearly the entire time I’ve owned the Umbrel Home — just the handful I noted near the beginning of ownership.

There are a few limitations and annoyances that are worth noting, though.

16GB of memory is often the most pressing bottleneck. I have a lot of apps installed and many of them have received updates that improve memory usage over the time I’ve had them installed, but it’s still the biggest limitation of the hardware.

I wish it was easier to install apps that aren’t available in the Umbrel app store. They’ve done their best to help mitigate this with the introduction of community app store support and adding Portainer and other apps where you can install your own containers. But I’ve never had success with them. I haven’t been able to find any community stores that have the apps I want and configuring Docker containers with the apps available has never gone smoothly. I’m sure this is primarily because of knowledge gaps on my part, but I just wish there was an easier way.

Although I have been able to work with the 2TB of storage available in my Umbrel Home, there are apps that I would have liked to run on the Umbrel that I couldn’t because of storage limitations. Immich being the biggest one. We have about 1TB of photos in our Immich instance that’s currently running on our Mac Mini home server, but the main reason it’s running there is because I wouldn’t have enough storage on the Umbrel alongside my other data. If there was a way to connect external drives and have apps keep their data there, that would be great. But I don’t believe that’s possible at the moment.

Overall

Would I still recommend the Umbrel Home? Yes. It’s an excellent machine that’s only improved in the time I’ve used it. Between the introduction of new apps to the store and new improvements in the OS — like a new file manager, added backup functionality, and bug fixes — I think UmbrelOS and the Umbrel Home are an excellent choice for anyone looking to dabble in self-hosting or those that want to expand their existing setup.

Pricing is a bit of a sticking point for me with the current model. It starts at $599 now, which is quite a jump from the $399 that I paid for it back in 2024. And the base model only comes with 1TB of storage. If you want 2TB it’ll cost you $699 and 4TB goes for $949.

But that’s more a reflection of the current price of storage and computer hardware in general. I’m sure you can put something together with similar hardware specifications for less, but I don’t think you’d save that much. And although you can still install UmbrelOS on your own hardware, you will miss out on some features and support. I think the extra cost is worth it.

But then we get to the Umbrel Pro. I don’t think that’s worth purchasing. Upgrading to the Umbrel Pro, the price starts at $699 and that only includes 64GB of eMMC for UmbrelOS. If you want additional storage, you have to bring your own SSDs or pay for overpriced storage at the time of purchase to have them pre-installed.

And it’s not as if the additional performance is enough to make a massive difference for most use cases. If you want something more powerful for running local LLMs or other performance hungry applications, you’re probably better off looking elsewhere and/or building your own machine for the purpose.

Similarly, if a large amount of storage is what you need, the Umbrel Pro isn’t necessarily the best option for that either. Sure, it has four M.2 slots for SSDs, but SSDs are really expensive right now. If you want a ton of storage, you’re much better off with 3.5-inch SATA drives, which the Umbrel Pro can’t really accommodate aside from using a USB enclosure. And at that point you’re stuck with a messy setup and the inability to install applications on those large external drives — for things like media storage with a Plex or Jellyfin server, for example.

I would say, skip the Umbrel Pro entirely. The Umbrel Home will be plenty for most users and is an excellent piece of hardware. I have, on numerous occasions, considered recommending one to my less technically inclined family members as a Time Machine backup solution that would also allow them to dip their toes into the world of self-hosting. It really is that good.

The upgraded Umbrel Home now features an Intel N150 and is available with 1TB of storage for $399, 2TB for $499, and 4TB for $699.

I’ve been very happy with my Umbrel Home — it’s my favorite piece of homelab kit. For anyone interested in building out a home server setup, this is the first machine I’d recommend looking at.

I’m not in love with the pricing for each of the storage options, though. I paid $399 for the original Umbrel Home with 2TB of storage. So you’ll be paying more for the same amount of storage.

Having the option for 4TB of storage is nice, but the pricing on that model is pretty rough. You can use external storage with the Umbrel Home, which helps, but there isn’t an easy way to expose that storage to apps you have installed — Plex for example. If the Umbrel team can get that sorted out, that would help quite a bit with the storage pricing.

As an owner of the previous Umbrel Home, this new model isn’t enough to have me interested in upgrading. The faster processor is great and the option for additional storage is nice to have, but the biggest limiting factor for me is the system’s RAM. And that hasn’t been upgraded — it’s still at 16GB.

I have twenty apps installed on my Umbrel and I’d love to install more. I have enough storage and CPU to do so, but I’m getting a bit tight on RAM. I would have loved to see 32GB of memory as an option. That would have had me thinking more seriously about making an upgrade.

➝ Source: m.youtube.com

The Umbrel Home is a tiny, $399 home server that runs UmbrelOS — a home server distribution that’s most commonly used for cryptocurrency applications, but is just as capable as a general purpose home server operating system.

The machine features an Intel N100, 16GB of memory, 2TB of storage, and gigabit ethernet. It also includes Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and three USB ports, although I haven’t been able to find any use for those with the stock operating system. At least not the current version.

The product is quite slick, especially the setup process. You connect it to your network with an Ethernet cable, plug it in to power, wait about 30 seconds, and open the dashboard in a web browser.

From there you can create your account, go through some basic setup questions, and start installing apps.

Applications and Features

UmbrelOS offers an excellent assortment of applications. From files and productivity to media and more. You can find an app for just about any use case. At the moment, I have the following installed on my Umbrel:

• Bitcoin Node — Allows you to run your own, personal Bitcoin node. This can be paired with other applications to reduce reliance on third-parties for wallet apps and other Bitcoin-related services.
• Calibre Web — An ebooks server. I’m using it to store PDF copies of product manuals for the items in my home.
• File Browser — A simple file management application.
• Jellyfin — An excellent open source media server.
• LibreTranslate — An open source alternative to Google Translate and other similar services.
• Lightning Node — Lightning is a layer 2 payment protocol that allows for more efficient Bitcoin transactions. Running your own node lets you participate in the network by routing payments and self-custody your Bitcoin on Lightning.
• Mealie — A recipe server. I don’t have too much in it now, but I plan to give my wife access when I have a chance so that we can both store and share recipes through it.
• MeTube — A web interface for downloading videos from YouTube and many other video hosting sites.
• Overseerr — A slick requests manager with Plex integration.
• qBittorrent — A BitTorrent client with support for proxies.
• Transmission — Another BitTorrent client with an interface I prefer, but without built-in support for proxies.

You can view the whole application store on the web, but Home Assistant, Nextcloud, and Plex are a few other notable entries.

Aside from the application store, Umbrel has some simple system monitoring, which you can use to keep an eye on storage, memory, and CPU usage. There are also some basic settings like the option to select a different wallpaper, enable two-factor authentication, and remote Tor access.

The Issues

Although the experience has been generally positive, I have run into a handful of snags along the way.

• I’ve run into occasional SSL errors with my Lightning Node. The fix is relatively simple, but requires using SSH or the system’s built-in command line interface.
• The Bitcoin Node has randomly dropped to zero peers and stops updating. Restarting the app hasn’t resolved the issue for me and I end up having to reboot the entire system.
• Speaking of rebooting, the first time I tried using the “Restart” option from within the web interface, the reboot never completed. I waited for several minutes and eventually used the power button to force the shutdown. Since then I’ve only used the “Shutdown” option in the web interface and then started it back up using the power button on the front. That method has been far more consistent for me.
• I’ve had instances where the Umbrel becomes randomly inaccessible from some of the computers on my network.
• There’s been a couple of times where my two-factor authentication codes didn’t work for logging in. I had to disable the feature from another system where I was already logged in. I can’t say for certain whether this was an Umbrel issue or something wrong with 1Password, though.

UmbrelOS did receive a software update while I was writing this piece, which claims to address the issue where it was inaccessible on the network. But I haven’t had enough time with it to know for sure.

Aside from those bugs, there is one glaring omission on UmbrelOS. And it feels like the kind of feature that the team should be working diligently on, if they aren’t already. UmbrelOS needs support for USB storage.

I still have plenty of storage left on my Umbrel — 2TB is a great starting point — but if you wanted to use the device for Plex, Jellyfin, or Immich, you’ll almost certainly end up wanting additional storage.

Overall

The Umbrel Home is an excellent package overall. The interface is slick and it offers a great assortment of applications on a sufficiently powerful system for a decent price. If the team is able to address the bugs and add support for USB storage devices, it feels like something I could recommend to average users.

As it is now, I think of the Umbrel Home as more of an option for tinkerers and technically savvy individuals. The type that aren’t afraid to jump into a terminal from time to time, but want something that’s a bit easier to get up and running than the alternatives. Or perhaps, this would be a good option for a more technically savvy person to setup for a family member, knowing that there could be the need for occasional support when things go wrong.