QuickBox Lite

QuickBox Lite turns a fresh Debian or Ubuntu server into a seedbox with a web dashboard from one script, and v1.6.1 ships 40 install modules for adding applications afterwards. It is free and open source, created by the GitHub user amefs as a lighter version of QuickBox Community Edition. Its first version, v1.0.0, is dated 20 September 2019; the current version as of October 2026 is v1.6.1, whose changelog entry is dated 26 July 2026 and which added Authelia as a login gateway for the web dashboard and an installer choice of no provider, Authelia or Vouch Proxy.

QuickBox Lite at a glance
Type	Seedbox installer, management scripts and web dashboard
Licence	GNU General Public License v3
Author	amefs
Derived from	QuickBox Community Edition (GPL-3.0)
First version	v1.0.0, 20 September 2019
Current version (October 2026)	v1.6.1 (changelog dated 26 July 2026, tagged commit dated 31 July 2026)
Supported systems	Ubuntu 20.04, 22.04 and 24.04; Debian 11, 12 and 13; amd64 only (README)
Management command	`box`
Source	github.com/amefs/quickbox-lite
Documentation	wiki.ptbox.dev (English and Simplified Chinese)

Origins: QuickBox Community Edition

QuickBox Community Edition (CE) is the free, GPL-3.0 seedbox installer published at github.com/QuickBox/QB. Its first commit is dated 6 April 2017, its GitHub releases run from v2.5.1 (April 2017) to v2.6.0 (February 2022), and its last commit is from 31 March 2022. The CE README carries an undated deprecation notice: development and support of the Community Edition are being sunset because the author is "devoted to the further developments of QuickBox Pro", the paid edition sold at quickbox.io. The repository is not archived.

QuickBox Lite's author worked on that project: amefs is the second-largest contributor to QuickBox CE, with 135 commits behind JMSDOnline's 594. The QuickBox Lite README describes the result:

This project is a modified version of the QuickBox community edition. This project aims to build a lightweight QuickBox software kit. Most of the functions of QuickBox CE are retained, but only the most commonly used stable third party software included.

The first changelog entry, v1.0.0, lists "Porting most of the functions in QuickBox Community Edition", adds Netdata, noVNC, DenyHosts, Fail2ban and Flood, and rewrites the box command. The repository was created on 30 July 2019 and is not a GitHub fork; its master branch starts with the commit "Release v1.0.0" on 20 September 2019. The one-key install script still credits the original project in its header ("Original Repo: https://github.com/QuickBox/QB", "Credits to: QuickBox.io").

QuickBox has more than one descendant. swizzin also started from QuickBox and replaced the QuickBox dashboard with its own panel in 2020. QuickBox Lite kept the QuickBox dashboard and reworked it instead.

Project	Relation to QuickBox CE	Licence	State in October 2026
QuickBox Community Edition	The original free edition	GPL-3.0	Sunset notice in the README, last commit March 2022
QuickBox Pro	Paid edition the CE notice points to	Paid	Sold at quickbox.io
QuickBox Lite	Modified version by amefs, a CE contributor	GPL-3.0	v1.6.1, July 2026
swizzin	Fork that later replaced the dashboard	GPL-3.0	3.15.0, February 2026

What "Lite" means

The README lists five main features: a graphical installation guide in more than one language, nginx instead of Apache, modular installation, support for the latest operating systems, and up-to-date applications with prebuilt Debian packages. The prebuilt BitTorrent clients spare the server from compiling them, which the README says "can significantly reduce the installation time as well as CPU requirement". The README ties the name to choice: "The panel no longer needs the support of ruTorrent. You can select what you need, and this is also why the project named "Lite"."

The installer

The README one-liner fetches https://git.io/qbox-lite, which redirects to onekey.sh in the repository. That wrapper upgrades the system first, then places the project in /etc/QuickBox and starts setup.sh. Without username and password arguments, setup.sh runs as a text-mode dialog guide; with -u and -p it installs unattended, and since v1.6.1 it can also read its answers from a JSON "kickstart" file.

The questions cover a domain for a Let's Encrypt certificate, the hostname, the SSH port, the admin account, FTP, a dashboard theme, the timezone, the package source and download mirror, the dashboard login provider, the software to install, public-tracker blocking, BBR congestion control and a reboot at the end. The SSH port dialog pre-selects 4747, labelled "security port", and the README's option list says "use 4747 by default"; QuickBox CE also ran SSH on 4747.

The SSH port dialog opens on 4747, the port QuickBox CE also used, so the QuickBox convention carries over unless the admin picks "default".

The login provider dialog is the newest. Version 1.6.1 added Authelia (with password, multi-factor and passwordless modes) and an installer choice between no provider, Authelia and Vouch Proxy (OpenID Connect). Without a provider, the dashboard asks for an HTTP password.

"Choose an auth provider for the dashboard", the login-gateway choice that v1.6.1 introduced.

The software checklist names the core clients with version labels; ffmpeg and linuxrar come ticked when it opens.

"Install Software": rTorrent, Transmission, qBittorrent, Deluge, mktorrent, ffmpeg, filebrowser and linuxrar, each with a version label (see Versions below on how current those labels are).

The installer closes on a Finish dialog that reports how long the install took and offers a reboot.

Dashboard, console and the box command

The web dashboard is served by nginx and fed by a WebSocket status service, quickbox-ws, a Node.js process. It shows bandwidth totals, server load, CPU, disk usage and torrents loaded, a Service Control Center to restart or disable each application, and a Package Management Center to install or remove further applications (35 entries in v1.6.1). The "Web Console" menu item opens a browser terminal, ttyd, which runs a bash shell as the admin user. In v1.6.0 the dashboard's WebSocket backend was refactored into modular TypeScript.

The QuickBox Lite dashboard in the default "smoked" dark theme, logged in as the admin user, with qBittorrent and the Web Console in the Service Control Center.

The dashboard's own command help lists the box commands: box install APPNAME, box remove APPNAME and box update APPNAME manage applications, box update quickbox upgrades QuickBox Lite itself, box iotest runs a quick read/write test of the disk and box troubleshoot generates a log for troubleshooting.

Applications

The installer's own help names the core set: rtorrent, rutorrent, flood, transmission, qbittorrent, deluge, mktorrent, ffmpeg, filebrowser and linuxrar. These and the rest of the catalogue are install modules: v1.6.1 has 40 of them in /etc/QuickBox/packages/package/install, grouped by use in the table below. Not all of them install free software: the dashboard itself describes BTSync as "a proprietary peer-to-peer file synchronization tool".

Use	Modules
Torrent clients and web UIs	rtorrent, rutorrent, flood, qbittorrent, deluge, transmission
Torrent tools	mktorrent, autodlirssi, flexget, art (auto-remove torrents), pbh (PeerBanHelper), qbclientblocker
Media servers	plex, emby, jellyfin
Usenet	sabnzbd
Files and sync	filebrowser, filebrowser-ee, h5ai, webdav, rclone, syncthing, btsync, cifs, nfs
Dashboard login	authelia, vouchproxy
Server and access	lecert, netdata, denyhosts, fail2ban, openvpn, docker, novnc, x2go, speedtest, znc, pyenv
Utilities	ffmpeg, linuxrar

Versions

QuickBox Lite does not publish GitHub Releases; the releases list is empty and versions exist as git tags and changelog entries. The changelog runs from v1.0.0 to v1.6.1 in 32 entries. Selected entries, with the date each one carries:

Version	Changelog date	Notable changes (changelog)
v1.0.0	20 September 2019	Port of QuickBox CE; Netdata, noVNC, DenyHosts, Fail2ban and Flood added; `box` rewritten
v1.3.3	10 April 2020	One-key install mode
v1.5.1	19 October 2021	Debian 11 support
v1.5.2	1 January 2022	ttyd replaces Shellinabox as the web console
v1.5.4	27 May 2022	Ubuntu 22.04 support
v1.5.8	27 July 2023	Debian 12 support
v1.5.10	3 April 2024	Ubuntu 18.04 dropped
v1.5.11	10 January 2025	Ubuntu 24.04 support; Debian 10 dropped; qBittorrent default raised to 4.6.7
v1.5.12	11 December 2025	Debian 13 support; PeerBanHelper; Transmission 4.0.6 by default
v1.6.0	4 July 2026	nginx mitigation helper for CVE-2026-42945; PHP 8.4; dashboard backend refactored into modular TypeScript
v1.6.1	26 July 2026	Authelia; installer choice of none, Authelia or Vouch Proxy; kickstart configuration files

The changelog date is the one in each entry's "Changelog update" line, not always the day the version was tagged. The git tags of the last four versions point to commits dated 12 January 2025 (v1.5.11), 31 December 2025 (v1.5.12), 4 July 2026 (v1.6.0) and 31 July 2026 (v1.6.1), so for v1.5.12 the two dates are 20 days apart.

Version strings inside the installer are not always current. The one-key wrapper's header still reads "Current version: v1.5.6" in the v1.6.1 code, and the software checklist labels qBittorrent "v4.2.5", older than the 4.6.7 default the v1.5.11 changelog names. Installing QuickBox Lite records which version an install actually gets.

Supported systems

The README lists Ubuntu 20.04, 22.04 and 24.04 and Debian 11, 12 and 13, all amd64, as passing; Ubuntu 16.04 and 18.04 and Debian 9 and 10 are marked end-of-life. QuickBox CE's README lists Ubuntu 16.04 and 18.04 and Debian 9, all three now on QuickBox Lite's end-of-life list. The server can be bare metal or a virtual machine on KVM, Xen or VMware; OpenVZ is not supported. The README asks for a 64-bit x86_64 CPU, more than 1 GB of RAM and 20 GB of disk, more for seeding.

Maintainers and community

The master branch holds 261 commits. GitHub's contributors list is led by tautcony (135 commits) and amefs (117), followed by bodayw, dependabot and Magic-glass. The changelog credits tautcony with the dashboard backend work. Support runs through GitHub issues ("please assign an issue here, I will try my best to help you") and the QuickBox Lite Knowledge Base at wiki.ptbox.dev, which is written in English and Simplified Chinese.

Current status

In October 2026 the amefs repository is not archived, with 877 stars and 109 forks on GitHub. The last commit on master is the v1.6.1 version bump of 31 July 2026.

Pulsed Media ran v1.6.1 on Debian 13 in October 2026 and it worked, once a minimal image had two problems fixed. That run, step by step with its timings, footprint and the fixes, is written up in Installing QuickBox Lite.

At Pulsed Media

QuickBox Lite keeps the QuickBox lineage alive under GPL-3.0; Pulsed Media's own platform, PM Software Stack (PMSS), is GPL-3.0 as well and can be used standalone, with no commercial restrictions (self-hosted install). On Pulsed Media's seedbox plans PMSS arrives preinstalled and maintained, running in Pulsed Media's Finnish datacenters, so there is no installer to run.

Sources

QuickBox Lite README: project description, supported systems, requirements, installer options
QuickBox Lite CHANGELOG: v1.0.0 to v1.6.1
QuickBox Lite tags and the GitHub API: tag dates, contributors, repository state
QuickBox Community Edition: CE history, deprecation notice, contributors
QuickBox Lite Knowledge Base
Pulsed Media test install of QuickBox Lite v1.6.1 on Debian 13, 29 October 2026: installer dialogs, install modules and dashboard