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Why

Sonarr and Radarr made films and TV boring in the best way: ask once, it shows up. Books never got that, and manga is worse. A French manga release is named something like Berserk (01-41+) (Miura) (2004) [Digital-1920] (PRiNTER-PapriKa+), packs overlap single volumes, editions (Perfect, Deluxe, Colossale…) mix with the regular run, and no *arr understands any of it. So you end up reading torrent titles by hand, volume by volume.

Lire does that reading for you. It is built for people who self-host their library and want the whole series, not a list of search results.

What it does

• Finds the series, whatever you type. AniList for the canonical record, Kitsu to recover from typos, MangaDex for French titles and French synopses.
• Understands French release names. A tested parser turns titles into volume sets (T01-T41, (01-41+), Tome 12 + 3HS, lists, counts), spots editions, and leaves out chapters, art books, other languages and unreadable formats, telling you why.
• Plans the cheapest complete download. A weighted set cover picks the fewest, healthiest torrents (official ebooks and CBZ first, scanlations last) that cover every volume you do not own yet.
• Shows the answer as a shelf. Owned, on the way, planned, missing and dead volumes read at a glance, before any text.
• Follows ongoing series. Tap "Follow new volumes" and Lire checks the trackers on a schedule, grabbing every volume after the last one you have. A new volume that only exists inside a big pack is flagged for you instead of pulling gigabytes you already own.
• Never leaves a download stuck. A watchdog replaces torrents that stop moving with the best live release covering the same volumes.
• Files everything for Kavita. One folder per series, Kavita scan triggered when files land, missing covers pushed from AniList, and an "Adding to the library" state until Kavita has indexed it.
• Picks up where you left off. The library opens on a "Continue reading" row (Kavita's On Deck, per account): one tap and the reader opens at your page.
• Helps you find the next one. The search page shows trending and all-time favourite manga from AniList, and for comics a curated list of essentials plus what just landed on your trackers.
• Any volume, any page. The detail sheet lists every volume (read, in progress, new): pick one, slide to a page, and the reader opens right there.
• One series, not two. Releases shipped as loose images (one folder per volume) are packed into CBZ next to the other volumes, and Lire's Kavita libraries skip loose images, so a series never shows up twice. The original files stay put and keep seeding.
• Resumes your reading. Library cards and the detail sheet show "page X of volume N" and open Kavita's reader right there, per account.
• Comics and BD mode. Same flow for comics and Franco-Belgian albums, searched straight on the trackers.
• Pick the language of your volumes. Each series shows what exists ("Available in FR 43 · EN 41 · JP 12"); your choice is remembered. Every language gets its own folder and its own Kavita library, created automatically, so editions never mix.
• French and English interface, switchable at any time. Synopses come in your language: native French from MangaDex, English from AniList, and an optional local LLM (Ollama) translates the rest, cached.
• Accounts for friends. The admin creates accounts in one tap; each one gets a twin Kavita account with the same password.
• Made for the couch. An installable PWA designed on an iPad Pro 13": 48 px touch targets, keyboard support, reduced motion, WCAG AA contrast on a dark surface.

How it works

flowchart LR
  U[You] -->|"Berserk"| L(Lire)
  L -->|titles, synopsis| M[AniList · Kitsu · MangaDex]
  L -->|search every alias| P[Prowlarr]
  P --> T[(Your trackers)]
  L -->|parse, plan, add| Q[qBittorrent]
  Q -->|files per series| D[(Library folder)]
  L -->|scan, covers, progress| K[Kavita]
  K --> D
  U -->|read| K

1. Resolve the series and gather every alias (French, English, romaji, synonyms).
2. Search Prowlarr with the best few aliases in parallel and merge the results.
3. Parse each release (app/parse.py): series match, edition, format, language, volumes.
4. Plan (app/plan.py): weighted greedy cover of the missing volumes, then prune redundant picks; implausible volume numbers are capped against the known count.
5. Grab: torrents go to qBittorrent with a per-series save path and tags; the scanner loop asks Kavita to scan each finished folder, and the watchdog swaps dead torrents.

Requirements

qBittorrent, Kavita and Lire must see the same folders: qBittorrent writes to them, Kavita reads them, Lire mounts them to delete series cleanly.

Quick start

git clone https://github.com/Joopinhontas/lire.git
cd lire
cp lire.env.example lire.env && chmod 600 lire.env
# fill in LIRE_PASSWORD, SESSION_SECRET, the Prowlarr / qBittorrent / Kavita URLs and keys
echo "MANGA_DIR=/srv/media/manga"   >> .env    # host folders shared with qBittorrent and Kavita
echo "COMICS_DIR=/srv/media/comics" >> .env
docker compose up -d

The prebuilt image runs on amd64 and arm64 (Raspberry Pi, most NAS). Pin a version with LIRE_VERSION=1.0.0 in .env, or build from source with docker compose up -d --build.

Open http://localhost:8160, sign in as admin with LIRE_PASSWORD, search for a series.

To reach it from elsewhere, set LIRE_BIND=0.0.0.0:8160 in .env and put it behind your HTTPS reverse proxy (Lire sets its own CSP and security headers; let the proxy add HSTS).

Configuration

Everything lives in lire.env; lire.env.example documents each variable. The ones people usually touch:

More than one language

French is the default, but a series can be fetched in English, Japanese (raw), Spanish, Italian or German too. Lire reads language tags in release titles; for indexers whose releases carry no tag (Nyaa is English), declare them with INDEXER_LANGS=5:en (Prowlarr indexer ids). Non-default languages go to manga-lang/<code> next to your manga folder: mount it in Kavita as /manga-lang (and comics-lang as /comics-lang) and Lire creates "Mangas EN", "Mangas JP"… on first use and opens them to every account.

Kavita inside Lire (optional, nice on iPad)

If Kavita runs with the base URL /kavita/ and your proxy serves it under Lire's own host, set PUBLIC_URL and Lire opens the reader in the same installed app instead of a new tab:

location /kavita/ {
    proxy_pass http://kavita:5000;
    proxy_set_header Host $host;
    proxy_http_version 1.1;
    proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
    proxy_set_header Connection "upgrade";
}

On an iPad

Open Lire in Safari, tap Share, then Add to Home Screen. It runs full screen like an app, and Kavita opens inside it when the location above is set.

Security

• Sessions: HMAC signed __Host- cookie, HttpOnly, SameSite=Lax, revoked on password reset.
• Passwords hashed with scrypt; login throttled per IP and per username, with constant time checks.
• CSRF header on every write, admin only routes, per user rate limits on searches.
• Strict CSP, COOP, CORP, Permissions-Policy, no-referrer.
• Container: read-only root, every capability dropped, no-new-privileges, unprivileged user, pinned and audited dependencies.

Found a vulnerability? Open a private security advisory rather than an issue.

Development

python3 -m venv .venv && . .venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt pytest
pytest -q

The test suite runs on real release titles (anonymised fixtures in tests/fixtures). When a title is parsed wrong, add it to tests/test_parse.py first, then fix the parser. The frontend is plain ES modules in app/static, no build step; interface strings live in app/static/i18n.js and must exist in both languages. Design principles are in docs/DESIGN.md.

Roadmap

What comes next is tracked in issues: more English release fixtures, Komga support, notifications when a series lands, and metadata pushed into Kavita. Ideas and questions are welcome in Discussions.

If Lire saves you an evening of reading torrent titles, a star helps other readers find it.

Responsible use

Lire automates searching and downloading through tools you already run. It hosts nothing and ships with no indexer. Use it for content you have the right to download where you live, and support the authors and publishers whose work you enjoy.

License

PolyForm Noncommercial 1.0.0. Free to use, study, modify and share for any noncommercial purpose: personal use, hobby projects, research, education, charities, public institutions. Selling it, hosting it as a paid service or using it inside a commercial product requires a separate license: open an issue to ask.

This is a source-available license, not an OSI-approved open source one. That is deliberate: the project stays a gift to readers rather than raw material for someone else's paid service.