Alternatives to Shairport Sync
An AirPlay and AirPlay 2 audio receiver that turns a Linux machine into a network speaker. The listings below can replace it for an important use case. Each note says what changes if you switch.
The original
Shairport Sync
An AirPlay and AirPlay 2 audio receiver that turns a Linux machine into a network speaker.
Replacements
Listings that take over the same core job as Shairport Sync.
Snapcast
A multiroom client-server audio player that keeps every client time-synchronized with the server.
Snapcast replaces AirPlay reception with its own client-server system that keeps clients in sync across rooms, requiring a server and a client on each playback device.
piCorePlayer
A minimal Raspberry Pi audio system that works as a Squeezelite player, music server or both.
piCorePlayer turns a Raspberry Pi into a Squeezelite player or server for synced multi-room playback, using the Squeezebox ecosystem instead of AirPlay.
spotifyd
An open-source Spotify client that runs as a lightweight UNIX daemon on headless machines.
spotifyd makes a headless Linux machine a Spotify Connect speaker instead of an AirPlay receiver, and depends on Spotify's service.
Similar software
Related functionality, not a direct replacement.
OwnTone
An open source audio media server that streams your music library to AirPlay, Chromecast and DAAP clients.
Airfoil
A Mac app that streams audio from any application to AirPlay, Chromecast, Sonos and Bluetooth speakers.
Volumio
A music player operating system that turns a Raspberry Pi or PC into a network audio streamer.
moOde audio player
An open-source audiophile music player and streamer operating system for Raspberry Pi computers.
SoundSource
A Mac menu bar tool for per-app volume, output routing, audio effects and AirPlay streaming.
