Sadly, Plex needs a subscription and it’s only worth it if you buy the lifetime on a flash sale.

yeaaaaaaah, and thats a big nope. Why does one need a subscription or a lifetime lease when you supposedly can self host? Subscription is what brought us into this mess in the first place.

Edit: I believe for me it was remote access ease of use by Plex that I use heavily.

Setting up a Wireguard / VPN isn’t that hard, and cuts out unwanted Corpos as well.