nefarious review 2026: the free, open source self-hosted movie and TV download automation tool combining Jackett and Transmission, features and alternatives.
nefarious is a free, open source, self-hosted application that automates finding and downloading movies and TV shows, combining the request management of Ombi with the tracking capabilities of Sonarr and Radarr into a single unified tool. It is maintained on GitHub by the developer lardbit as part of the broader self-hosted \"*arr\" media automation ecosystem.
Rather than reimplementing torrent search and downloading itself, nefarious orchestrates two other established open source tools: Jackett for aggregating torrent search results across configured indexers, and Transmission for actually performing the downloads, making it a lightweight coordination layer on top of proven components.
nefarious supports configurable quality profiles for automatic resolution and codec targeting, keyword-based filtering of search results, and a wanted/watch-list system for tracking desired content until it becomes available.
The application supports multiple user accounts with permission groups for shared or household use, and integrates with the Apprise notification library to send alerts to services like Discord, Slack, and Pushover when downloads succeed or fail.
nefarious is entirely free and open source, distributed as a Docker image with no license fees, subscriptions, or paid tiers of any kind.
The only costs involved are the user's own server hardware and any VPN or torrent indexer subscriptions they choose to pair it with, none of which are provided or required by the nefarious project itself.
nefarious is used to automatically search for and download movies and TV shows, combining request management and tracking similar to Ombi, Sonarr, and Radarr in one tool.
Yes, nefarious is completely free and open source with no license fees or paid tiers.
Yes, nefarious relies on Jackett for torrent search aggregation and Transmission for downloading; both must be configured alongside it.
nefarious combines the functionality of Sonarr, Radarr, and Ombi into a single application, whereas those are separately maintained, more actively developed dedicated tools.
Yes, nefarious is commonly deployed alongside media servers like Plex, Jellyfin, or Emby as part of a broader self-hosted media stack.
nefarious is maintained on GitHub by developer lardbit, though it has a smaller contributor base and slower release cadence than more mainstream *arr-ecosystem tools.
The legality of downloading content via torrents depends on the content and the user's jurisdiction; nefarious itself is a general-purpose automation tool and users are responsible for complying with applicable laws.