I can find most everything I want/need on public trackers, so I’ve never felt the need to jump through their hoops; however easy that would be.

Great as long as it’s easy to maintain ratio. And by “easy” I mean basically not having to do anything that can’t be automated. I also don’t care enough about the harder-to-get-in trackers that I would spend a lot of time sending in screenshots of profiles of other trackers I’m on or whatever. I’m not trying to get internet points for being on the very “coolest” private trackers.

The good thing is that decent private trackers have a well maintained catalog and most content usually has at least one or two seeders even months/years after the torrent was created, and these seeders often have a ton of bandwidth.

In contrast, public trackers often falsely advertise the amount of peers in the swarm (so a torrent that’s supposedly alive is often dead). I’d say I’m grabbing about 80/20 from private/public trackers, and I seed each torrent for around 30 days. Public torrents are often so starved for somewhat decent seeders that I regularly have a ratio of 20+ after the 30 days I’m seeding for. And that’s without a seedbox, just a normal Internet connection.

In the end, both are fine. When you setup your *arr tools correctly, they usually choose a decent release automatically, whether from private or public trackers.

Better quality releases and more active users with much less leeches as they get thrown out.
Though there are many site admins with some complex here too… your experience can vary.

And of course you need to contribute to the community, most trackers will grant you buffer for both uploading and keeping the torrent running. You want something, then you have to give back.
If the tracker doesnt give possebilities to build your buffer in multiple ways, other than just uploading, its usually a shit tracker.
And some are just super hard to impossible to get into. Start small, wait for open signups or just go to new trackers, they might get bigger over time.
Dont publicly beg for invites, you can humiliate yourself in private chats if you are into that.

I’ve used them and can find a lot of stuff that isn’t available on the more open seas, but maintaining ratio is a big issue, not sure if it’s my setup or the tracker itself, so I can’t download as much as I want to.

I’ve only been part of one private tracker, and I got kicked from them after not logging in for a month despite meeting ratios. haven’t bothered since then

I do use private trackers but only if I can’t find something on public trackers

ITT: the sourest of grapes.

Only because I was randomly invited to one by a friend, otherwise I wouldn’t have bothered with it.

I love my privates :)

TL;DR: Great to have if you’re looking for less popular content, high quality files, and/or are concerned about copyright notices, but the rules that keep the niche content alive make them less appealing for super popular content.
I randomly made friends IRL about a year ago and got an invite to BTN & PTP. I don’t watch/download a lot of movies, so my account at PTP has lapsed, but I’ve kept my account with BTN.
From my recent searches, BTN tends to have higher quality files and more seeders than public trackers, but since a) I have a seed box, which provides a line of defense against copyright notices, and is only strengthened my my *aars (gets me in & out of the swarm before the studios find it), b) I usually can’t tell the difference in quality from the devices I’m using (and my friends/family most definitely don’t notice/care), c) seed ratio or time doesn’t impact access to public trackers, and d) I prefer to keep public torrents alive, I usually lean towards public trackers, and only use the private trackers for things that are harder to find and/or things I want in high quality.
I still try to seed to a minimum ratio of 3.0 on popular files (public or private), and ∞ for more niche files, but sometimes demand is so low, and I need to move files off of my seed box. While a ratio below 1.0 makes me feel “stuck” no matter where I got the file from, private tracker rules definitely amplify that feeling.

It’s mainly all I use. The consistent quality is super nice. Though when PTP was down for a month or two I ended up back on Usenet too.

BTN and PTP aren’t hard to maintain ratio on.

Redacted can be a bit of a pain, and I’ve had to fix my ratio there a few times. But I had a few CDs from some small local bands I’m using Usenet more for music at the moment so lidarr doesn’t tank my ratio so quick.

I don’t use private trackers…

They’re the tits. Public trackers are literal trash by comparison. Like comparing Notre Dame to a busted gas station chapel in Missouri.

What are some good public trackers for movies and shows? With VPN enabled of course.

Just use I2P 🤷 It’s slow, but it’s safe

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