Onboarding wizard

The onboarding wizard runs the first time you open Sublarr and writes the answers straight into the Settings UI / database. You can re-open it later from Settings → General → Re-run onboarding if you want to redo a step. Postponing the wizard hides it for seven days; dismissed steps don’t lose their data.

Step 1 — Setup mode

Sublarr can run in two modes:

Mode	When to pick it
Sonarr / Radarr	You already use the *arr stack. Sublarr will read your library from Sonarr/Radarr and write subtitles next to the source files.
Standalone	You point Sublarr at one or more folders on disk. No Sonarr/Radarr required. Library scanning falls back to filesystem walk + metadata lookup.

The choice is not permanent — switching later is allowed under Settings → Connections. The wizard skips steps that don’t apply to the chosen mode (Standalone skips path mapping; *arr skips the standalone folder picker).

Step 2 — *arr instances (Sonarr / Radarr)

Only shown in *arr mode. For each *arr you want to connect:

Field	Effect
URL	Base URL including scheme and port, no trailing slash. Example: http://sonarr:8989.
API key	From Sonarr → Settings → General → API Key.
Test	Calls /api/v3/system/status. Green = reachable + auth OK.

Multiple instances are supported — add as many Sonarr/Radarr endpoints as you need; Sublarr will dedupe by media ID across them.

Step 3 — Standalone folders

Only shown in Standalone mode. Each row is one folder Sublarr will scan recursively:

Field	Effect
Path	Absolute path inside the container (e.g. /media/anime).
Label	Display name in the Library sidebar.
Scan	Triggers an immediate scan after saving.

Caution

Paths must exist inside the container. If you mounted /srv/anime on the host as /media/anime in Docker, enter /media/anime. The wizard tests for read access before saving.

Step 4 — Path mapping

Only shown in *arr mode and only when Sublarr’s media path differs from Sonarr/Radarr’s. The mapping translates between Sonarr/Radarr’s view (e.g. /data/series/) and Sublarr’s view (e.g. /media/series/). See Path Mapping for the full reference; the wizard lets you set one mapping pair and tests it against a real series.

Step 5 — Language

Field	Effect
Source language	The language Sublarr translates from. Defaults to en (English).
Target language	The language Sublarr searches and translates to. Defaults to de (German).

Per-series overrides land in Language Profiles later — this step sets the global default.

Step 6 — Providers

The wizard offers the three providers most users start with:

Provider	Field	Where to get it
OpenSubtitles.com	API key	opensubtitles.com → Account → API (REST, not the legacy XML-RPC).
Jimaku	API key	jimaku.net → Settings → API Token (anime focus).
SubDL	API key	subdl.com → Account → API.

All three are optional — you can configure others later in Settings → Providers. Skipping the wizard step disables nothing; it just leaves the keys empty.

Step 7 — Automation

Toggle	Effect
Auto-search	Sublarr searches providers on every library scan, not only on demand.
Search interval	How often the wanted-scanner ticks. Default: every 6 hours.
Upgrade enabled	Replace existing subtitles with better-scoring ones when found.

Step 8 — Ollama

Only shown if translation will likely be enabled. Sublarr asks for the Ollama base URL and a model:

Field	Effect
Ollama URL	Default http://localhost:11434. Point it at the host running Ollama.
Model	Default qwen2.5:14b-instruct. Anything you’ve pulled with ollama pull works.
Test	Calls /api/tags and reports model availability.

Tip

Translation is off by default even after this step — toggle it on in Settings → Translation when you’re ready. The wizard just stages the connection so the toggle works first time.

Step 9 — Media servers

Optional. If you run Plex, Jellyfin, or Emby, configure them here so Sublarr can refresh the library after writing subtitles:

Field	Effect
Server type	Plex / Jellyfin / Emby.
URL	Base URL with scheme and port.
API key / token	From the server’s settings.
Test	Round-trips to the server’s identity endpoint.

Step 10 — First scan

Final step. Sublarr triggers a library scan, and the wizard renders progress as items come in. When the scan completes the dashboard appears with the populated library counts and the Get Started banner becomes a permanent dismissal.

Note

You can leave this step running in a background tab — the scan continues server-side even if you close the browser. Re-opening the dashboard shows the live progress under Settings → System → Scheduler → Library scan.