Stream Downloader

Reaparr supports two download methods for fetching media from your Plex server. Direct downloading is the default and works for most setups. The stream downloader is an alternative that can be enabled per server when direct downloading fails.

Download methods

Direct download (default)

The direct download client fetches the original media file from Plex using standard HTTP range requests with multi-threaded downloading, powered by Downloader. The file is downloaded as-is, with no transcoding, exactly as it was stored on the Plex server. This is the recommended method for all setups.

Direct downloads supports pause and resume — if a download is interrupted, Reaparr can pick up from where it left off.

Stream downloader

The stream downloader uses Plex's MPEG-DASH streaming pipeline to download media. Instead of fetching the raw file, Reaparr initiates a Plex transcoding session via the video/:/transcode/universal endpoint, retrieves a DASH manifest (.mpd), and uses dash-mpd-cli to download and mux the resulting video and audio segments into a single output file.

Key differences from direct downloading:

Enabling the stream downloader

The stream downloader is disabled by default and must be enabled individually for each Plex server.

1. Open Settings in Reaparr
2. Navigate to your Plex server and open its settings dialog
3. Go to the Server Configuration tab
4. Toggle Allow Stream Downloader on

Once enabled, all new or restarted downloads from that server will use the DASH stream downloader instead of direct downloading.

To revert, toggle the setting back off. The change takes effect immediately for any new downloads started after the toggle.

When to use it

The best solution is always to ask the server owner to grant you download permission in Plex. This allows direct downloading to work and guarantees you receive the original, unmodified file.

Only enable the stream downloader if direct downloading is failing. There have also been cases where a Plex account has download permission but direct downloading still fails. The clearest signal that the stream downloader may help is the following error:

Empty download stream

This error means Plex refused the direct file request entirely. The stream downloader works around this by going through the streaming pipeline instead, which Plex permits even without explicit download access.

In all other cases, leave the stream downloader disabled.