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OpenCarStream - MJPEG Streamer for the integrated browser in your car

Stream any video to your Tesla browser via MJPEG.
No <video> element inside. Supports YouTube, Twitch, X/Twitter, Pluto TV, IPTV lists, and more.

Architecture

Tesla browser
    │  GET /watch?url=https://youtube.com/watch?v=xxx
    ▼
[nginx] (optional TLS + DDNS domain)
    │
    ▼
[streamer container]
  yt-dlp stdout
    │ pipe
  ffmpeg stdin → JPEG frames → multipart/x-mixed-replace
    │
    └──► Tesla sees a fast-updating <img> — not a <video>

Quick start

1. Clone / copy this folder to your server

scp -r opencarstream/ user@yourserver:~/
ssh user@yourserver
cd opencarstream

2. Build and start

docker compose up -d --build

If Docker Hub is flaky in your region, override the Python base image source:

PYTHON_IMAGE=mirror.gcr.io/library/python:3.12-slim docker compose up -d --build

3. Test locally

http://localhost:33333/health
http://localhost:33333/

4. Open in car browser

Navigate to your server's status page and use the Stream tab, or go directly to:

http://YOUR_SERVER_IP:33333/

or directly using the url

http://YOUR_SERVER_IP:33333/watch?url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO_ID

Channel feed & subscriptions

The Channel Feed tab lets you browse recent uploads from any YouTube channel and click to stream them directly.

Browsing a single channel

Enter @channelhandle or a full channel URL in the feed tab and click Load Feed.

Syncing your YouTube subscriptions

Run sync_subscriptions.py once on your home machine to generate a subscriptions.json file. The streamer reads this static file — no cookies or YouTube access needed inside the container.

Step 1 — generate subscriptions.json

Make sure you are logged in to YouTube in your browser, then run:

# Chrome
uv run sync_subscriptions.py --browser chrome

# Firefox
uv run sync_subscriptions.py --browser firefox

# Other supported browsers: chromium, brave, edge, opera, safari
uv run sync_subscriptions.py --browser brave

yt-dlp reads your browser's cookie store directly — no export or extension needed. The script fetches only the channel list (not videos) and finishes in a few seconds. You will see output like:

Fetching subscriptions from YouTube…
✔ 112 channels written to subscriptions.json

Re-run this command whenever you follow or unfollow channels.

Step 2 — mount it in the container

docker-compose.yml already has the volume configured:

volumes:
  - ./subscriptions.json:/subscriptions.json:ro

After generating the file, restart the container to pick it up:

docker compose restart streamer

Step 3 — use it in the UI

Open the Channel Feed tab. A My Subscriptions panel will appear automatically. Click Load Subscriptions, then click any channel to browse its recent uploads and stream a video.

Note: if you prefer to export cookies manually instead of using --browser, install the Get cookies.txt LOCALLY Chrome extension, export while on youtube.com, then run: uv run sync_subscriptions.py --cookies /path/to/cookies.txt

Expose to the internet (DDNS)

Option A — No-IP / DuckDNS / Dynu (port forwarding)

  1. Sign up for a free DDNS provider (no-ip.com, duckdns.org, dynu.com)
  2. Install their update client on your server or router
  3. Port-forward TCP 33333 (or 443 if using nginx TLS) on your router to the server
  4. Open Tesla browser to: http://yourname.ddns.net:33333/

Option B — Cloudflare Tunnel (no port forwarding needed)

# Install cloudflared
curl -fsSL https://pkg.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-main.gpg \
  | sudo tee /usr/share/keyrings/cloudflare-main.gpg >/dev/null
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/cloudflare-main.gpg] \
  https://pkg.cloudflare.com/cloudflared any main" \
  | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/cloudflared.list
sudo apt update && sudo apt install cloudflared

# Authenticate and create tunnel
cloudflared tunnel login
cloudflared tunnel create opencarstream
cloudflared tunnel route dns opencarstream stream.yourdomain.com

# Run (or add to systemd)
cloudflared tunnel run --url http://localhost:33333 opencarstream

Tesla URL becomes: https://stream.yourdomain.com/

Option C — Nginx + Let's Encrypt TLS (with DDNS domain)

  1. Uncomment the nginx service in docker-compose.yml
  2. Edit nginx.conf → set your domain in server_name
  3. Get a free TLS cert:
sudo apt install certbot
sudo certbot certonly --standalone -d stream.yourdomain.com
sudo cp /etc/letsencrypt/live/stream.yourdomain.com/fullchain.pem certs/cert.pem
sudo cp /etc/letsencrypt/live/stream.yourdomain.com/privkey.pem   certs/key.pem
  1. docker compose up -d

Environment variables

Variable Default Description
PORT 8080 HTTP port inside container
MJPEG_FPS 24 Frames/sec sent to client
FFMPEG_QUALITY 3 JPEG quality: 1=best, 31=smallest
STREAM_WIDTH 1920 Output width (px)
STREAM_HEIGHT 1080 Output height (px)
MAX_STREAMS 3 Max parallel video streams
AUDIO_DELAY_MS 0 ms to delay video start after audio
LOCAL_MEDIA_DIR /media/videos Local Media folder path inside container
IPTV_LISTS_DIR /iptv_lists IPTV list folder (.m3u/.m3u8) inside container
SUBSCRIPTIONS_FILE /subscriptions.json Path to subscriptions JSON inside container

Override in docker-compose.yml under environment:.

Local Media in Docker

The Local Media tab reads files from inside the container, not directly from your host filesystem. Use a bind mount:

environment:
  LOCAL_MEDIA_DIR: /media/videos
volumes:
  - ./local-media:/media/videos:ro

Then put your videos on the host in ./local-media (next to docker-compose.yml), or change the left side to any host path, for example:

volumes:
  - /home/username/oocal-media:/media/videos:ro

After changing mounts/env:

docker compose up -d

Multiple directories via YAML only (no manual script)

You can define multiple mounted folders in docker-compose.yml and the container will show them as subfolders in Local Media directly.

environment:
  LOCAL_MEDIA_DIR: /media/videos
volumes:
  - ./local-media:/media/videos:ro
  - /home/santi/videos:/media/videos/home-videos:ro
  - /mnt/nas/media:/media/videos/nas-media:ro

Then just run:

docker compose up -d --build

Notes:

  • Symlinks are followed by the scanner (followlinks=True).
  • This avoids compose override generation and keeps everything in one YAML.
  • You only declare each extra directory once (in volumes).

IPTV lists in Docker

The IPTV tab loads playlist files from a folder mounted in the container.

environment:
  IPTV_LISTS_DIR: /iptv_lists
volumes:
  - ./iptv_lists:/iptv_lists:ro

Put your playlist files in ./iptv_lists next to docker-compose.yml, for example:

./iptv_lists/sports.m3u
./iptv_lists/news.m3u8

Then run:

docker compose up -d

Open the IPTV tab, pick a list by name, and all streams from that playlist will appear automatically.

Supported sources

Any URL that yt-dlp supports works in the Stream tab or /watch?url=:

Source Example URL
YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO_ID
Twitch live https://www.twitch.tv/channelname
Twitch VOD https://www.twitch.tv/videos/VOD_ID
X / Twitter https://x.com/user/status/TWEET_ID
Pluto TV Built-in channel list in the Pluto TV tab (US, no account)
IPTV list .m3u / .m3u8 files in the IPTV tab (iptv_lists/)

For Twitch and YouTube VODs, use the Twitch and YouTube tabs respectively to browse and pick a stream. For X/Twitter, paste the tweet URL directly in the Stream tab.

API endpoints

Endpoint Description
GET / Status dashboard (Stream / YouTube / Twitch / Pluto TV / IPTV / Info tabs)
GET /watch?url=… Watch page (MJPEG video + audio)
GET /feed?channel=URL&limit=N JSON list of recent uploads for a channel/user
GET /iptv_lists JSON playlist files discovered in IPTV_LISTS_DIR
GET /iptv_streams?list=NAME JSON stream entries parsed from a playlist
GET /subscriptions JSON channel list from subscriptions.json
GET /health {"ok":true} — for uptime monitors
GET /status JSON list of active streams

Legal Notice

OpenCarStream is a third-party, unofficial project. Tesla is a trademark of Tesla, Inc. OpenCarStream is unofficial and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tesla. YouTube is a trademark of Google LLC, Twitch is a trademark of Twitch Interactive, Inc., and X/Twitter is a trademark of X Corp.; OpenCarStream is not affiliated with or endorsed by any of them.

Tips

  • Bookmark it in Tesla: Save http://yourserver/ as a bookmark and use the UI
  • Lower bandwidth: Set MJPEG_FPS=15 and FFMPEG_QUALITY=6 in docker-compose.yml
  • Update yt-dlp (YouTube changes frequently): 
    docker compose build --no-cache && docker compose up -d

Troubleshooting

Symptom Fix
Black screen in Tesla Make sure URL ends in /watch?url=... not just /
502 Pipeline error yt-dlp may need updating: rebuild image
DeadlineExceeded while pulling base image Retry with a mirror: PYTHON_IMAGE=mirror.gcr.io/library/python:3.12-slim docker compose build --no-cache
Stream stutters on LAN Lower MJPEG_FPS to 12–15
Can't reach from internet Check port forwarding / firewall; try curl http://yourserver:33333/health from outside
Container exits immediately docker compose logs streamer to see the error
Subscriptions panel not visible subscriptions.json not mounted — check volume in docker-compose.yml
‼ yt-dlp failed in sync script Make sure you are logged in to YouTube in the browser you specified

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On-the-fly conversion of videos and live streams to MJPEG streams to enable support in car browsers

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