MediaCMS is a free, open-source video and media CMS built on Django and React. Compare its features, self-hosting options, pricing and alternatives.
MediaCMS is an open-source content management system purpose-built for video and other media types, letting organizations run their own self-hosted video and media portal. Development began in mid-2018, led by Markos Gogoulos on the backend and Yiannis Stergiou on the frontend, with EngageMedia joining as a Product Development Partner in 2020.
The platform is released under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0, and is built using Django for the backend and React for the frontend, with a REST API supporting integrations and custom clients.
MediaCMS supports video, audio, image, and PDF uploads, multiple publishing workflows for controlling visibility, and role-based access control that connects users to groups with defined view and edit permissions on media items.
The platform includes automatic transcription through a locally run Whisper integration, in-browser video editing to trim, replace, or create new segments from uploaded footage, and a customized video.js player with multiple resolution and playback speed options.
MediaCMS itself is free and open source, with no license fee to self-host on your own infrastructure. Organizations that need help deploying or customizing it can purchase professional services directly from the MediaCMS team, including custom installations, feature development, migrations, integrations, training, and support.
Third-party managed hosting providers also offer MediaCMS as a hosted service, with entry-level pricing around $11 per month reported by at least one provider, though this is separate from the official open-source project.
MediaCMS is used to build and run a self-hosted video and media portal, similar in purpose to a private YouTube or Vimeo, for organizations that want to control their own media hosting.
Yes, MediaCMS is free and open source under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0. There is no license fee to self-host it.
MediaCMS is built with Django (Python) on the backend and React (JavaScript) on the frontend, exposing a REST API.
Yes, MediaCMS integrates with a locally run instance of the Whisper speech recognition model to generate automatic transcripts for uploaded video and audio.
MediaCMS can be deployed using Docker Compose, or via an automation script that installs and configures all required services on a server.
Both are open-source, self-hosted video platforms. MediaCMS is built on Django and React with features like in-browser editing and Whisper-based transcription, while PeerTube is built around federation using the ActivityPub protocol to share content across servers.