What Are the Main Parts of Karaoke Eternal (Server, App, Player)?

Karaoke Eternal is built from three parts: a Server that hosts the web app and your media files, an App that guests open in their phone's browser to find and queue songs, and a Player that runs fullscreen on the system handling audio and video for a room. You need all three for a working party setup, but only the server is a separate piece of software you install — the app and player are both browser-based views of the same web app.

Server: the self-hosted backend

The server is the only component you install and run yourself. It does two jobs:

• Serves the web app to every browser that connects (guests' phones and the player machine).
• Serves your media files so the player can stream them.

According to the project, it "runs on pretty much anything," and there are several installation methods available. It is fully self-hosted, with no ads or telemetry.

If you're planning hardware, this is the machine that needs to stay on for the duration of the party and hold (or have access to) your song library.

App: the guest-facing mobile browser interface

The app is described as a "fast, modern mobile web app designed for 'karaoke conditions'" — meaning it's built to be usable in a dark, noisy, distracted party setting rather than at a desk.

What guests do with it:

• Find songs in the library.
• Add them to a queue.
• Join easily via QR codes and guest accounts.

Because it's browser-based, guests don't install anything. They point their phone's browser at the server and start queuing.

Player: the fullscreen room output

The player is "just another part of the app," but it's meant to run fullscreen on the system handling audio/video for a room. It's also fully browser-based, so the machine driving your TV or projector just needs a browser pointed at the server.

Supported playback and visuals:

One practical consequence worth knowing before you plan your audio gear: microphones are not required, because the player itself only outputs music. That lets you keep the audio setup as simple or as complex as you like — the app doesn't handle mic input.

How the three parts fit together

A typical party looks like this:

1. The server runs on any always-on machine and holds your media.
2. Guests scan a QR code, land in the app on their phone browser, and queue songs.
3. The player runs fullscreen on the room's audio/video system and plays whatever the queue serves up.

The queue is shared between them, so what guests add on their phones is what the player outputs.

Multiple rooms

Karaoke Eternal supports multiple simultaneous rooms/queues, and these can optionally be password-protected. That matters for the three-part structure because each room is effectively its own queue and its own player instance — useful if you're running two separate spaces (or two separate crowds) from one server.

What this means for setup planning

• One server, many browsers. You install the server once; app and player are just browser sessions against it.
• The player machine needs a browser and a display/audio path, not special client software.
• Guest devices need nothing but a browser and a way to reach the server (QR codes make that easy).
• No mic handling in the app, so plan your microphone setup separately from Karaoke Eternal.

For step-by-step instructions, the project points to its Getting Started guide, with separate documentation for the server, app, and player.