Bring back ‘Play Version’ prompt dialogue for movies with multiple versions (4k & 1080p etc.) when a user hits the ‘Play’ button.
Instead of nested menus to select ‘Play Version’ can we have back a dialogue pop-up when a user hits ‘Play’ that allows users to select the version they want: 4K or 1080p etc. Obviously this will only be relevant for movies that have multiple, merged, versions.
This, I feel is more elegant, and better from a GUI point of view because a user will always go to hit ‘Play’ (its a prominent button on, say, the iOS app) instinctively, rather than choosing the ‘…’ or ‘more’ and then selecting ‘Play version’.
Also, a user might not know that an alternative version is available, but the prompt after they hit ‘Play’ would alert them immediately. No need for digging in menus to find out, it’ll be automatic.
I’m saying ‘Bring back’ because I was sure plex had this a while back.
Found this while looking for others with the same issue.
Isn’t Plex supposed to pick the best quality by default? Why is it that even on devices that fully support the video and audio codecs Plex plays the optimised Plex version that I’ve made for slower devices rather than the original?
No prompt or anything, even says the details of the original file in the description (HEVC Main 10, TrueHD 7.1 Audio) yet when I push play I get the Plex converted copy.
Tbh even if it didn’t support the audio I’d still rather it play the original and convert the audio on the fly, I only made the conversions for older devices that don’t support x265 properly.
It depends on the playback device, the connection, and if subtitles are being used or not. I suggest that you start a new thread in the forum area for your playback device so folks can help you determine the cause.
I was going to request this too. The issue I have is Plex picks a 4K HDR UHD version on my UHD TV in the lounge over the 1080p SDR version even though the TV isn’t HDR capable and the playback then looks overly bright and colours are saturated as a result. I’d rather play the 1080p version by default if HDR isn’t available.
I’d be happy if I could enable it to prompt which version to play instead of it automatically guessing. It is obviously matching the UHD resolution to the TV but it’s ignoring the fact the video file is HDR and is unaware that my TV cannot show HDR and Plex can’t do conversion to SDR either.
My most painful use case actually deals with television episodes. Many popular series get HD versions that are just remastered crops. For something like ‘The Simpsons,’ it’s unbearable since hundreds of gags get cut out of the shots, but I’d still like the HD versions for people who don’t care about that. There’s about 20 seasons presented in original 4:3 - the sheer number makes it difficult to simply break them apart the way I do with different versions of films like Blade Runner and Star Wars.
Please bring this back…
It is so annoying, non-tech people don’t get how to play different versions.
I have many series that have 4K, 1080p and SD versions.
Some 4K have 100k Bitrate, so some connections are not capable of streaming them, or when being watched on 1080p Monitor, 4k doesnt make that much sense.
Even if I select a 1080p Version, on the next episode autoplay, it always goes back to 4K version. Then I need to close the stream, go into the episode and choose play version and go to 1080p Version.
This is SOOO annoying and a usability nightmare…
Why not make the version select popup available as a setting that is off by default, instead of removing it completely?
I’m standing up my latest hardware setup for Plex and so I’ve been out of touch and use for about a year trying to wait on a graphics card to go into the new rig (still waiting). However I was loading my files onto the system I completely forgot about the feature that has been very useful in the past that shows the 2,3 or however many version that you have when viewing them online with Mac OS. I have a lot of movies with 4k, HD, and 3D versions of the same title. Well since doing this for the last couple of weeks I’ve not seen that feature pop up until today and only on one movies series. When I went back and viewed that same movie later that indicator was not there and is not present on any other movie. Is that something that can be turned off and on? Why isn’t it showing? Using and unraid headless server and I Mac running Big Sur (latest).
Please bring it back and if anything make it optional. They way if I clicked on a file and I have the option turned on it will ask me which version do I want to play. If turned off or if set to Auto or something it will do what it does not and choose what plex thinks is the best version to play.
This is desperately needed. The current method of choosing what version to play is incredibly unintuitive and is causing me a lot of problems, to the point that I’m seriously considering splitting the different qualities into their own separate libraries if this isn’t improved.
how on earth is this still a feature request 6 years later? can the plex mods get their heads out of their own arses and add this back as an option in the menu that we can toggle.
Plex is supposed to automatically pick the correct version, but most of the time from my experience it does not.
I used to have my 4k movies in a separate library that I didn’t share with my parents who do not have a 4k TV and also have slow internet. I kept reading about how we didn’t need to do this anymore because Plex would automatically pick the correct version and not Transcode if you had two versions of the same movie in the same folder. I got rid of my 4k only Library and now I have two versions a 4k DoVi/HDR10 and a 1080 non HDR version. Most of the time (about 80-90%?) Plex will not pick the 1080 version when my parents watch, it will STILL pick the 4k and Transcode. They are using a non4k Roku on a non 4k TV with internet too slow to stream my 4k movies, but it still will not pick the right version.
My wife who refuses to use any client except for the LGTV Plex app, will watch a movie on the same network as the server, and Plex will play the 1080 version. If I use the Firestick 4kMax Gen 2 that I have I think it will play the 4k version, but the LGTV will play the wrong version on the 4k OLED TV.
I think, what the original poster is asking for, since the server can’t seem to figure out which version to play itself, is a pop-up asking the people what version they want to play, and it makes sense. My parents are over 80 years old and will NEVER see that small print showing more versions and click it to select to correct one, no way. My wife who is not old will NEVER see it and pick the 4k version. If I am not thinking about it, even though my art says the movies is available in 4k sometimes I forget to pick the correct one. The way they have it set up is dumb. and not user friendly.
But they would pick the correct version from the popup? No they won’t. We’ve been there and had the popup and it was the reason people seperated their libraries, because all the people trying to play 4K media on their clients not capable of.
This would be great to see with some options to configure at the client level, much like the intro options to configure.
I think the feedback shared makes a lot of sense, so as an example only if each client level could have the option to decide either manually select play version , or auto select highest quality.
I as well have the same issues with my remote clients, my in home network, not an issues to just play the highest quality i.e UHD Blury over HD Bluray, but it still would be helpful to be able to select a play version when there is multiple editions, i.e. Remastered, Anniversary etc. I don’t like the idea of having multiple movie library as a work around or to have one library with 2-3 versions, just the one movie and then be asked which version to play.
But with that said, being able to custom edit the play version from either the edition form field or another tag would be useful.
For remote clients, not everyone has 8k or 4k, or they may not have the bandwidth , so having them select the version is helpful too, instead of it being transcoded down, when there is just a better direct play version to use…
I agree on the client side option. That would be nice. But the options should be Manually, Auto (like it’s now), Highest quality (invoking transcode if not compatible), Lowest quality
Plex automatically chooses a version, that could be direct played instead of transcoding down from an incompatible version.
I would prefer manual myself for all movies, not just for the 2k vs 4k, but also say remastered vs anniversary vs extended etc., but it could make sense as more tv shows are in 2k and 4k, so if a library or series could remember\set to a version, so you don’t have to choose every time if you are watching whole seasons.
another example recently was a nvidia shield on a 2k display, it picked the 4k and transcoded, but it should have selected the 2k version, as that is the type of display it was connected. I think there is many good ways to beta test and get pooled feedback, I just hope it actually happen to help everyone out a little more!
When a movie exists in more than one version in the same library (720p, 1080, 4K) and you press “Play” it should show the “Play Version” menu instead of playing the larger version (which I think it does).
