Opportunities › Self-hosted media sharing and image hosting › Proposed app
Shoalbox
Run your own photo and video sharing site, with your rules and your storage
- Score
- 44
- confidence 41
- Evidence
- 4
- items on the page
- Rivals
- 2
- named in sources
- First version
- 60 d
- estimate
- Type
- Desktop app
- PWA: runs in the browser, installs on Mac and Windows
- Market since
- 2004
- Mature market · AI estimate
ScreensConcept
Desktop app: Platform operators manage multi-tenant spaces, review uploads, and write rules—work requiring dense configuration and oversight done at a desk. Sample screens on a computer, in the proposed brand. Their numbers are sample data.
Spaces
All storage healthy4 spaces
About this appAI proposal
Shoalbox is a media hosting service you run as a progressive web app. Upload photos and videos, organise them into galleries and share links, on a site that carries your name and follows your rules.
It is made for organisations, creators and platform operators who do not want their content and members tied to a centralised image host. You choose where files are stored, who may upload and what is allowed.
Each tenant gets its own space with its own members, policies and storage target. One install can serve a club, a studio and a client brand without mixing their data.
- Tagline
- Your pictures, your rules, your servers.
- Voice
- PlainSteadyIndependent
- Why this name
- A shoal is a group moving together, and a box is a place you keep things. Together: many communities, each with its own container.
In the first version
Members say which features they would use. It tells PWAS what people want; it changes no score.
Multi-tenant spaces
Run many communities from one install. Each space has its own members, branding, domain, rules and quotas.
No member yet
Choose your storage
Connect each space to its own storage backend, such as an S3-compatible bucket, and move files between them.
No member yet
Rules you write
Set upload limits, allowed file types, review queues and takedown steps per space. No outside policy imposed.
No member yet
Galleries and share links
Group photos and video into albums. Share by public link, private link or member-only access, with optional expiry.
No member yet
Brand identityAI proposal
Check the name against trademark registers before using it.
Palette
#1E5560Deep Harbor · primary#F5F1E8Sand Paper · surface#1C2528Ink · text#E2692FBuoy Orange · accent#8FC1B5Sea Glass · data
Typography
Aa
Shoalbox
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ 0123456789
Your pictures, your rules, your servers.
PricingAI proposal
The material gives no competitor prices. These tiers are a starting point to test, including whether to offer a managed-hosting option.
Community
Free
- One space
- Your own storage
- Up to 25 members
- Full data export
Team
$29 a month
- Up to 5 spaces
- Custom domain
- Review queues
- Usage overview
- Email support
Operator
$99 a month
- Unlimited spaces
- Multiple storage backends
- Per-space quotas
- Priority support
Would you pay Team · $29 a month?
Your answer tells PWAS which prices people accept. It changes no score.
No answers yet.
What it could be worthEstimate
What a software business making this much sells for today, from real deals. Pick a monthly revenue.
If it makes
Worth about
$194,000
Sale range $132,000 to $263,000
$120,000 a year in revenue
From 87 software businesses listed and sold on Empire Flippers in the last year, revenue vetted by the broker: they sell for about 19× their monthly revenue, most between 13× and 26×.
Measured on profit, the middle deal is 32× monthly net profit: about 2.7 years of profit.
An estimate, not an offer or financial advice. A real price depends on profit, growth, churn, how much of the work is the owner's, and the buyer.
How it would growAI proposal
How the product would reach new customers through its own use, and how the first ones would be found. A plan to test, not a result.
- Built-in loop
- Shared outputs. Members share albums and image links with people outside the site. Pages and links can show a small 'hosted with Shoalbox' footer that operators can remove on paid tiers.
- Do they become customers?
- Viewers of shared links are mostly not operators. Test whether the footer brings any operators to sign up, versus relying on direct outreach.
- First customers
- Small organisations such as photo clubs, schools and local archives with one technical volunteer, who want to host their own media instead of using a centralised service.
- Where to reach them
- Self-hosting communities: Post a working demo and a setup guide where people share self-hosted tools, and ask for feedback.
- Photo club outreach: Offer free setup to ten clubs and archives in exchange for interviews.
- First milestone
- Five organisations running a live space for 30 days, with two paying for the Team tier.
Why people already pay for this
- VerifiedGitHub repository gained 1002 stars in 1424 days
- Public claimThere is demand for self-hosted, open alternatives to centralized media platforms with full user control over content, data, and rules.
- Public claimThe product has significant maturity and adoption, having been in development since 2007.
- Public claimMulti-tenancy and multi-storage capabilities are key features needed in this market.
Tech stack
Every proposal builds on the same PWA base, installable from the browser on any phone or computer. Dashed boxes are what this app adds.
- AppNext.js and TypeScript
- PWAManifest and service worker
- UITailwind CSS
- Data and authSupabase Postgres
- PaymentsStripe
- EmailResend
- HostingVercel
- This app · Object storageS3-compatible storage, per spaceMedia files are large; each space needs its own bucket or backend.
- This app · Video processingQueue-based transcoding workerVideos must be converted to web formats outside the web request.
RisksAI inference
- CommercialFree self-hosted options with long histories exist. Buyers may not pay for a newer product unless setup and multi-tenant management are clearly easier.
- TechnicalVideo transcoding and storage costs can grow fast and are hard to predict, especially for managed hosting.
- RegulatoryOperators host user uploads, so takedown duties, illegal content and privacy law apply. The product needs reporting and removal tools.
- DataMoving large libraries between storage backends can fail midway or be slow, risking lost or duplicated files.
Everything marked AI proposal or AI inference was written by a model from the evidence on the opportunity page. The proposed name must be checked against trademark registers before it is used.