Self-hosting ntfy for Push Notifications

Introduction

ntfy is a simple, lightweight notification service that allows you to send push notifications to your devices. This guide will walk you through self-hosting ntfy and integrating it with other services.

Common Issue: ntfy Not Working on HTTP

ntfy requires HTTPS for security reasons. We’ll address this by using Caddy as a reverse proxy.

Hosting ntfy with Caddy

Docker Compose Configuration

networks:
  caddy_net:
    external: true
    name: "caddy_net"

services:
  ntfy:
    image: "binwiederhier/ntfy:latest"
    container_name: "ntfy"
    command: ["serve"]
    networks:
      - "caddy_net"
    ports:
      - "8080:80/tcp"
    restart: "unless-stopped"
    user: "1000:1000"
    volumes:
      - "./config:/etc/ntfy"
      - "./cache:/var/cache/ntfy"
      - "./lib:/var/lib/ntfy"
      - "/etc/timezone:/etc/timezone:ro"
      - "/etc/localtime:/etc/localtime:ro"

Caddy Configuration

Add this to your Caddyfile:

ntfy.your-domain {
    reverse_proxy ntfy:80
}

Mobile Setup

1. Subscribe to a topic:

2. Test the notification by curl:

   curl -d "Hello World" ntfy.yourdomain.com/admin
   

3. Or Push notification via ntfy dashboard:

4. Mobile notification result:

Integration Example: Radarr

1. Configure Radarr to use ntfy:

2. Radarr notification result:

Auth

To enable authentication for your ntfy instance, follow these steps:

Update Docker Compose File

Add the following environment variables to your docker-compose.yml file under the ntfy service:

  environment:
    NTFY_BASE_URL: https://ntfy.paulcoding.com
    NTFY_CACHE_FILE: /var/lib/ntfy/cache.db
    NTFY_AUTH_FILE: /var/lib/ntfy/auth.db
    NTFY_AUTH_DEFAULT_ACCESS: deny-all
    NTFY_BEHIND_PROXY: true
    NTFY_ATTACHMENT_CACHE_DIR: /var/lib/ntfy/attachments
    NTFY_ENABLE_LOGIN: true
  volumes:
    - "./config:/etc/ntfy"
    - "./cache:/var/cache/ntfy"
    - "./lib:/var/lib/ntfy"

Create a User

1. Access the ntfy container shell:

   docker exec -it ntfy sh
   

2. Add a new user with admin privileges:

   ntfy user add --role=admin paul
   

3. Generate a token for the user:

   ntfy token add paul
   

For more details, refer to the ntfy documentation.

Sending Notifications with curl

You can publish messages to ntfy topics using curl. Below are examples for authenticated requests.

1. Using a Bearer Token

After generating a token for your user (tk_xxx), send a notification like this:

curl \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer <your_token>" \
  -d "Your message here" \
  "https://ntfy.paulcoding.com/<topic>"

Replace <your_token> with your actual token and <topic> with your topic name.

2. Using Basic Auth via Query Parameter

You can also authenticate by passing a base64-encoded username:password as a query parameter:

# Encode your credentials
echo -n "Basic `echo -n 'username:password' | base64`" | base64 | tr -d '='

Then use the encoded string in the auth query parameter:

curl \
  -d "Your message here" \
  "https://ntfy.paulcoding.com/<topic>?auth=<base64-credentials>"

Refer to the ntfy documentation for more details.

Conclusion

By self-hosting ntfy, you can have a secure, private notification system for various services. This setup using Docker and Caddy ensures HTTPS support and easy integration with other self-hosted applications.