Hello, I am also new at self hosting semi recently. There is a bit of a learning curve, but once your over the hump, it gets a lot better.

First, 100% use docker desktop if your using windows. Most github projects have a docker file you can use. This will take out 90% of the setup required and you don’t have to worry about applications not working on your computer. Thats the point of docker, to remove the “doesn’t work on my computer” problem.

Here are some independent github projects that I found useful for me and were simple to setup.

• excalidraw - digital whiteboard. You don’t need to self host this, but its a fun little project. You can just go to excalidraw.com and have 100% of the same features (it is all saved in your browser’s cache).
• mealie - I cook a lot so this is a nice ‘permanent’ cook book to have.
• warracker - I always forget what I have warranties on, so this will be helpful for me.
• Arr projects like sonarr, radarr, Jellyfin - sonarr and radarr is a good project to sink your teeth into (do not recommend using docker for this, I had issues with my docker container connecting to my external drives because I have Windows Home edition). This ecosystem is usually everyone’s first project along with pihole since its so useful. Sonarr and radarr will probably take you a week or weekend, Jellyfin will take like 5 min.

Louis Rossman, a strong advocate for the right to self-repair, has an extensive, bottom to top guide on self hosting your own services. It starts from introducing what a modem is and what role it plays, and it ends with an entirely self hosted cloud. It comes in article as well as 13 hour video form. I would highly recommend this to anyone looking to get started self hosting - it doesn’t just introduce software you should learn, but it also shows you how to configure it.

I will go even ONE step further than others - if you are scared to start a software like Truenas scale that has a GUI has helped me. A lot of the options offered by others are great but can require a lot of command line stuff. There are a few OS’s out there that are more point and click that I had a lot of success with. Truenas scale runs the docker containers that others are recommending.

First of all: take a breath!

Pihole is a great start, and an awesome piece of software. As self-hosting is quite broad, there are quite a few options, so I have two suggestions that should still be relatively simple to continue with, and that I thoroughly enjoyed when getting started.

1. Webservers: Something like Caddy, NGINX or Apache (Caddy being likely the simplest choice here), will allow you host your own website! If you open a port on your router, this website can also be accessed remotely (be careful! Without SSL, you should not expose any forms, to avoid those being leaked). A bit outside the realm of “self-hosting” — but Cloudflare allows you to setup SSL with relative ease and also allows you to link a domain your website.
2. Game Servers: Many options in this space, so take a pick for a game you like! I am an avid minecraft enjoyer, and regularly setup modded servers to play with my friends. You can find some more info here on how to get started with a Minecraft server implementation called “Fabric”

Have fun! And if there is something more specific you’re curious about, feel free to ask 😀

A lot of people recommend Docker, but I will go further and say to specifically use Docker compose.

That way all the configuration is in a file that you can backup/restore. Updating is really easy, and you will never forget one of the random flags you need to set.

• PiHole - you can use the custom DNS to route domain names to you npm
• npm (Nginx proxy manager) - allows easy access to all your services hosted on one box

I’m curious where you are from and what hardware for self hosting you have. I also want to know what you are interested in self-hosting or learning.

For me, my home lab started with networking. Yours doesn’t have to. For me, I had already achieved System Administration and was working to become a network engineer. Where are you on your path? In truth, starting with the network is not the best, mine required dedicated equipment: a firewall(UDM), switching(ubiquiti), and access points. This is expensive, so perhaps not the best place to stay.

I would say that a good place to stay is with virtualization and a hypervisor. A hypervisor is intended to run virtual machines. I think starting with a hypervisor is a good idea because once you have a hypervisor, you can experiment with just about anything you want. Windows, Linux, docker, wherever your exploration takes you.

Now, I would say the cheapest way to do this kinda depends on you. Do you have a .edu email address? If so, you should be able to receive free licensing for Windows Server through Microsoft imagine (previously called dreamspark). If not, do you have Windows 10/11 pro edition? I would say that Windows server may require dedicated hardware, but if you are already running Windows pro, then your daily driver pc will be capable of running hyper-v.

If you have an old spare computer, you can make it a dedicated hypervisor with either the Windows Server option, or in my opinion the preferable Proxmox. Proxmox may take a little time to get acclimated to since it is Linux command line, but you already have experience with that on the pihole.

Those are my recommended next steps to take. Though, there is plenty more that you can do. As others have said docker is a cool way to make some of this happen. I personally hate docker on Windows(it’s weird and I just want the command line not a UI). But you should easily be able to spin up Windows Subsystem for Linux, install docker and docker compose and get started there without needing any additional hardware. You could also do the same using hyper-v if you prefer and have a pro license.

Regardless of what direction you choose to go, you can go far, you can succeed, and you can thrive. And if you run into any issues, post them here. Selfhosted has your back, and we are all rooting for you.

Side Note: Hyper-v used to only be available on Windows Pro, but if someone knows for sure that it is available on home please let me know and I will update my post.

The easiest way to get started is using Docker. You can self-host most software using Docker straight from their Github with one command or copy-paste config.

Do NOT expose (Port forward/NAT) your services to the internet if you don’t know what you’re doing. Use it locally using IP:port. If you want to use your services remotely, use a VPN tunnel like Wireguard (Available on Android and iOS too). Modern routers already support it out of the box. Tailscale is also an option.

Later down the road when you start exposing services, I can recommend NPM as your proxy for easy host and certificate management. Expose as little as possible! For added security when exposing applications to the internet, expose your port using a VPS or Cloudflare and tunnel to your home using Tailscale or Wireguard.

To not get overwhelmed you should start small and improve as you go. You don’t need to start with a datacenter in your garage right away. The most important thing is that you have fun along the way :)

Great projects to get started:

• Nextcloud
• Immich
• PaperlessNGX
• StirlingPDF
• Pastes
• KirchenOwl

If you want to give Home Assistant a try like others are suggesting, save yourself some time and hassle and install Home Assistant OS in a virtual machine. While you absolutely can run it in Docker you lose out on some neat quality of life improvements like add ons (which, funnily enough, are Docker containers pre-configured to hook in HA).

Get Unraid for your server OS. Its nuts how good it is at being beginner friendly, while being robust when needed. It has a docker app “store”, as well as plugins, and a virtual machine manager as well. It also has a very, very nice Web GUI: you manage the server from another PC you use in your house.

I can not overstate how much I learned by starting with Unraid.

My adventure into self-hosting started with a Synology NAS maybe 5 years (?) ago.

With just the built-in software, I was able to replace Google Photos, Evernote, Dropbox, Google Calendar, Google contacts, and Google Play Music and Movies.

Then as I learned how to use docker, I was able to replace more services.

There may be “better” options out there beyond what Synology offers, but it’s been such a “set and forget” experience, that it’s easy for me to recommend them as an option.

The biggest barrier, IMO, isn’t the learning curve, but the initial investment for the NAS + HDDs and the upgrade path as your storage needs grow.

If you look up “Dr. Frankenstein Discord” you’ll find the community that helped me get familiar with Docker. As in, several people held my hands for about 2 weeks non-stop. I can’t tell you enough how much I love that group. But containers aren’t the only way to go.

I hear people talking about Proxmox a lot, and it seems (as far as I can tell) to be one of the easiest platforms for hosting many services one a machine. Next computer I set up, I’ll be going that route.

Regardless of how you do it, the knowledge base and skills mostly transfer like a Venn diagram. The most important pieces to get started are hardware and patience. Everything else can be solved with online teamwork

I feel like a lot of the answers in this thread are throwing a lot of things with a lot of moving parts: Unraid, Docker, YunoHost, all that stuff. Those all still require generally knowing what the hell a Docker container is, how to use them and such.

I wouldn’t worry about any of that and start much simpler than that: just grab any old computer you want to be your home server or rent a VPS and start messing with it. Just pick something you think would be cool to run at home. Anything you run on your personal computer you wish was up 24/7? Start with that.

Ultimately there’s no right or wrong way to do things. It’s all about that learning experience and building up that experience over time. You get good by trying out things, failing and learning. Don’t want to learn Linux? Put Windows on it. You’ll get a lot of flack for it maybe, but at the very least over time you’ll probably learn why people don’t use Windows for server stuff generally. Or maybe you’ll like it, that happens too.

Just pick a project and see it to completion. Although if you start with NextCloud and expose it publicly, maybe wait to be more comfortable with the security aspect before you start putting copies of your taxes and personal documents on it just in case.

What would you like to self host to get started?