Search anime in sub or dub, with poster-style results shown below the selection panel and the first English alternate title when available
Queue downloads with folder, quality, media type, season, and episode controls
Choose which download backends queue jobs may use: ani-cli, anipy-cli, and animdl
Track shows in a watchlist with Watching, Planned, Finished, and Dropped categories
Expose a small JSON summary endpoint for Homepage dashboard widgets
Refresh watchlist episode counts manually or on a schedule
Auto-download missing episodes for Watching entries after later refreshes, with a per-show Source name override for ani-cli search
Move fully completed libraries into Jellyfin TV or movie folders with tracked background handoff jobs that also appear in the Queue page
Send optional Discord webhook notifications
Serve a checked-in favicon.png as the site favicon

Quick start

Requirements:

ani-cli installed and available in PATH
Optional: anipy-cli and/or animdl installed and available in PATH if you want automatic fallback retries outside Docker
Common runtime tools used by ani-cli, especially curl, ffmpeg, fzf, grep, openssl, sed, aria2c, botan, and yt-dlp

Run locally:

./ani-cli-web

Open:

http://127.0.0.1:8421/

Useful flags and env:

./ani-cli-web --debug
ANI_CLI_WEB_HOST=0.0.0.0
ANI_CLI_WEB_PORT=8421
ANI_CLI_WEB_JOB_STDOUT=true
ANI_CLI_BIN=/path/to/ani-cli
ANIPY_CLI_BIN=/path/to/anipy-cli
ANIMDL_BIN=/path/to/animdl

Docker

Build:

docker build -t ani-cli-web .

Docker builds the app from the current local checkout.

Run:

docker run --rm \
  -p 8421:8421 \
  -e USER_UID="$(id -u)" \
  -e USER_GID="$(id -g)" \
  -v "$(pwd)/downloads:/downloads" \
  -v "$(pwd)/.ani-cli-web:/app/.ani-cli-web" \
  ani-cli-web

Compose:

USER_UID="$(id -u)" USER_GID="$(id -g)" docker compose up --build -d

Docker notes:

The container serves on 0.0.0.0:8421
Downloads are written under /downloads
App state is stored under /app/.ani-cli-web
USER_UID and USER_GID help keep mounted files owned by your host user
UPDATE_ON_START=true runs ani-cli --update before startup
ANI_CLI_WEB_JOB_STDOUT=true mirrors download job output to container stdout for log collectors; set it to false to keep job output only in the Queue page
botan is installed inside the container for providers or scripts that need Botan cryptography tooling
anipy-cli and animdl are installed systemwide inside the container at /usr/local/bin, linked from /usr/bin, and included in the runtime PATH; animdl is isolated in a Python 3.11 virtualenv so its pinned dependencies stay executable

Key behavior

Watchlist

Adding a show tracks it without downloading immediately
Later manual refreshes or scheduled refreshes can queue missing episodes
Download all queues every currently available episode for the chosen mode
Successful downloads sync back into the watchlist
TV entries move to Finished when the selected downloaded mode reaches the expected episode count
Movie entries can be treated as complete after download and routed to movie storage

Auto-download

Runs only for entries in Watching
Uses the per-show language, quality, Source name search override, season, library name, and optional episode offset settings
Can queue backlog episodes that were already available before the show was first tracked

Download fallback

Optional and configured from /config
Queue jobs can use any checked combination of ani-cli, anipy-cli, and animdl
Checked methods are tried in this order: ani-cli, anipy-cli, then animdl
Selecting one method disables fallback retry; selecting multiple methods makes later methods automatic fallbacks
Fallback retries keep the queued episode numbers when fallback downloader filenames are renumbered from 1
Docker images install anipy-cli and animdl automatically; non-Docker installs should provide the selected tools in PATH themselves

Queue retries

Adding a download that exactly matches an existing failed queue job reuses that failed entry and sets it back to pending
This avoids stacking multiple failed rows for the same episode when you queue the same job again

Jellyfin handoff

Optional and configured from /config
TV libraries move only after the show is finished and download-complete
Movie libraries move after download completion
Manual Run now scans the watchlist in a background job and shows live progress for processed entries, moved files, and the current destination path
Manual watchlist filesystem sync rechecks downloaded episode flags against the files currently present under the download library
Recent Jellyfin handoff jobs survive page reloads and show their latest status after app restarts

For Homepage's Custom API widget, use:

http://127.0.0.1:8421/api/watchlist/homepage

Example response:

{
  "watchlist": 12,
  "planned": 4,
  "finished": 31,
  "dropped": 2,
  "total": 49
}

This endpoint is intentionally small so Homepage can map the returned values directly into its widget fields.

Runtime info

The Config page runtime panel shows:

ani-cli-web version loaded from VERSION
Installed ani-cli version
Installed anipy-cli and animdl versions and dependency status
A Changelog button that opens a scrollable viewer backed by CHANGELOG.md

Remote access

By default the app only serves loopback clients.

To allow LAN or remote access:

ANI_CLI_WEB_ALLOW_REMOTE=1
ANI_CLI_WEB_AUTH_USERNAME=admin
ANI_CLI_WEB_AUTH_PASSWORD=choose-a-long-random-password

Optional remote path restriction:

ANI_CLI_WEB_REMOTE_PATH_ROOTS=/downloads:/srv/jellyfin-tv:/srv/jellyfin-movies

State and storage

Project state is stored in:

ani-cli-web/.ani-cli-web/

Main contents:

config.json
remote-sessions.json
state.sqlite3
thumbnails/

Downloaded files are organized like this:

ANI_CLI_DOWNLOAD_DIR/tv/Show Name/Season 01/Show Name - S01E01.mp4
ANI_CLI_DOWNLOAD_DIR/movie/Movie Name/Movie Name.mp4

Configuration

Most users only need these environment variables:

ANI_CLI_BIN
ANIPY_CLI_BIN
ANIMDL_BIN
ANI_CLI_WEB_HOST
ANI_CLI_WEB_PORT
ANI_CLI_WEB_ALLOW_REMOTE
ANI_CLI_WEB_AUTH_USERNAME
ANI_CLI_WEB_AUTH_PASSWORD
ANI_CLI_WEB_REMOTE_PATH_ROOTS
ANI_CLI_WEB_DEBUG
ANI_CLI_WEB_STATE_ROOT

Container-specific variables:

UPDATE_ON_START
USER_UID
USER_GID

Everything else can usually be configured from /config.

Testing

Run the regression suite with:

python3 -m unittest test_app.py

README.md

ani-cli web

What it does

Pages