Does Syncthing need a central server (with static IP)?

General
1

Hey, for running syncthing is necessary some kind of “main server”?

This is my use case: I want to be able to share my photos and thoughts with friends, but I don’t want to use Facebook, Dropbox and BTSync (because it’s insecure).

Does Syncthing need a central server (with static IP)? I’m looking for a solution that doesn’t need that. I have some ideas on how to do it (they are less user-friendly but doable), but I’m wondering if maybe Syncthing can be used without a central server (with central server I mean a machine with static IP that needs to be online all the time).

2

You don’t need a static IP if you have proper port forwarding configured on at least one side. Even without that, data will be transferred over relays.

As for an always-on server, that depends on your requirements. Of course data can only be transferred between devices that are online. So if you have your “client” devices online at the same time, you might not need a server.

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3

if your friends are online when you are too, data will be transferred from your device to theirs… so if they are not, youll need a server that is always “up”…but you wont need a static ip…