Quartermaster
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How-to28 September 2026Lewis E.

Letting the household request films without handing over your keys

When your partner wants a film or your flatmate wants the next season, they shouldn't need your Sonarr login to ask. A Family profile gives them browsing and requests through their own Seerr account, and everything else stays behind your PIN.

At some point someone in the house asks how they can put a film on the list. Handing them your phone, or your Radarr login, is the wrong answer. Quartermaster 1.2 added Family & Friends for this. A Family profile lets someone browse and request through their own Seerr account, while service management stays behind your PIN.

What you need

  • Quartermaster Pro on your device. Creating and sharing a Family profile needs Pro. Joining one is free.
  • A Seerr or Jellyseerr connection, and a Seerr account for each person. Requests are made as that person, so they arrive in Seerr under their name.
  • Radarr and Sonarr on their own aren't enough for Family requests. You can create the profile without requests and finish that part later.

Create the profile

  1. On Home, tap the profile button, then create a new profile with + or Create profile. Choose Family & Friends at the top of the sheet.
  2. Name the profile and choose the Seerr or Jellyseerr connection. Under Requests as, pick the member it should request as. Set an owner PIN if asked, then create the profile.
  3. Choose who it's for. They're borrowing this device is for someone using your phone or iPad. They've got their own device is for everyone else.

Set up their device

  1. Follow the access check for where they'll use it, then set an invite passphrase.
  2. Show them the QR code, or choose Share as a file.
  3. On their device, they install Quartermaster, open the invite (or tap I was given access and scan it) and enter the passphrase.

To invite someone to a Family profile later, open Profiles from your owner profile, edit that Family profile, open its Family settings and choose Set up their device.

Worth knowing

  • Keep the owner PIN to yourself. It's what stands between a Family profile and your service settings.
  • Send the passphrase in a different message from the invite.
  • An invite doesn't make a home-only server reachable from away. Their device still needs a way in, such as your home Wi-Fi or Tailscale. If it only works on the sofa, that's usually why.

Coming in 1.3

The new Entertainment Home in 1.3 has a Requests row that shows what the whole household asked for, so you can see what's on its way without opening Seerr. It's in the closed beta now. The rest is on the what's coming page.

Written while building Quartermaster, a native iOS app for self-hosted stacks.