I’ve seen a few requests for this going back to 2013 so I thought I would bring this back and combine a few different idea into one.
Merge Libraries - the ability to view multiple libraries as a single view. All animated films in one library, all documentary films in another, etc. Then a combined library that shows the content of all. The problem with just creating a new library that aims at ALl the media directories is you may have spent a lot of time cleaning up movie posters, names, etc.
Merge Servers. - If I have a server with 1,000 movies and a friend has one with 500 movies and he shares his server, can you get a combined view of both that only shows you your films and the films he has that you don’t. or a filter when viewing his server that only shows his unique movies that you don’t have. If 95% of our libraries are the same, it is a huge pain to see what he has that I don’t.
This is a good idea. As someone who runs my own server, I don’t really need this. But my users don’t care where a movie comes from, and they get confused about the different sources. This would help them see past the implementation details and have an easier time finding a movie.
I see your point, but have another suggestion… I recently took all 2500 of my files and actually used file-bot and properly re-named every one of them. What a pain… and I had to frequently call up the listing in my plex account to verify that file-bot got it right. So you can search for a title and it will span multiple servers/libraries… basically plex will look everywhere for anything you search for.
My collection is 5 distinct libraries on one server, and each library and all files are synced to 3 other NAS units (so I have 4 servers, each serving 5 libraries). This is for fail-safe, and I have them on power schedules so only 1 is up at any given point in time except for weekends.
Yes, it would be nice to consolidate servers/libraries, but please give the OPTION to do so as I don’t want that. I needed to be able to examine each server’s content as somehow, some movies were not copied across all servers
BTW… NO PLEX DANCE needed for a total re-build of each library! yay!
Petty much. My suggestion was to be able to group libraries of similar content together. So if you have a movie library of general films, but you also have a movie library of just animated, disney, documentaries that AREN’T in the main movie folder, then you could create a grouped library that shows all of them. If you had one in more than one place it would just show up once. Or maybe it could be listed as a duplicate. The deal is to have control over which libraries are in these library collections.
Got redirected here from a new thread I made. Some friends and I each run our own Plex server. Much of our content is the same. I would like the option to create one large global library of all the shared content across all the servers. That way we would not need to go browsing each server. Some settings for this would be to prioritize local copies over remote copies with the option for an exception if a higher-quality copy is available on a remote server.
This would start with each server admin enabling this feature on their server. Then the admin can build the new global library based on their method of organizing.
Create a global library
Select which servers to include in the global library
Create a specific library (Movies)
All libraries across all servers are shown.
Select which of those libraries are movie libraries
Complete movie library
This is then done again for TV, cartoons, music, documentaries, etc.
You can also select all, none, or specific metadata you want to import from the remote servers. This way you can organize all the shared content and metadata in your style. I for one adhere to a strict method of structuring everything. The method of organization, or lack thereof, on other servers can drive me crazy.
To add a new server to a pre-existing global library,
Add server
select remote libraries to merge into your specific libraries
I have multiple plex servers with different content on each. I find it a pain having to choose a video server to see its own content. Whilst I appreciate that you can search for content and jump straight to it, what I really want is for all content across all servers to be listed. So that films on server 1 and server 2 and any other servers I add all appear in one list. Ultimately, I dont care what the source is, I just want all of the options to be visible regardless of servers. Same for Tv etc.
I did look to see if this feature has been requested. I couldnt see one when I searched for it. Perhaps there could be a All option as well as individual servers.
I would like to request a feature for Plex that allows the consolidation of multiple libraries into a single, unified library interface. This feature would streamline navigation and playback by eliminating the need to switch between individual libraries for the same content.
Feature Description:
A consolidated view that merges the content of selected libraries (e.g., Movies-HD, Movies-4K, Movies-4kmux, etc.).
When selecting a title, instead of automatically playing it, Plex would display a “Playback Options” menu, allowing the user to choose which library/version they want to play from.
The playback menu could show useful details for each option, such as resolution, codec, file size, and audio format, helping users make an informed choice.
Benefits:
Streamlined User Experience: Users won’t need to manually search for the same title across multiple libraries, saving time and effort.
Content Accessibility: Ensures that all versions of a movie or show are readily available in one place.
Improved Organization: Offers a clean and efficient interface for managing multiple versions of the same content.
Example Use Case:
Imagine you have the movie “Inception” stored in three libraries:
Movies-HD: A 1080p version.
Movies-4K: A 4K HDR version.
Movies-4kmux: A remuxed 4K version.
In the consolidated library, clicking on “Inception” would display a menu like this:
Play from: Movies-HD (1080p, H.264, 6 GB)
Play from: Movies-4K (4K HDR, H.265, 12 GB)
Play from: Movies-4kmux (4K Remux, H.265, 55 GB)
Users can then choose the version that best suits their current device or network conditions.
That’s interesting. Having a gynormous library and several servers, and a few shared ones with friends, I’ve not had any difficulty choosing/finding/playing content. But we specifically made libraries like you did that hold varying versions - I will try the remux file first and if it doesn’t play/transcode well then I go for the next lower version, etc.
All the versions are easy to find - when I search on “Inception” I see it listed in every library available… and I just click the one in the library I want to try playing.
I guess I’m not sure what you are asking lol. This is the way I’ve always done plex. I started long ago separating versions into specific libraries/servers so I could stream to family in other cities - I created plain 720/mp4 versions of everything just for them. They search for a movie and know that the “Ares” server has the one that will play for them.
I had been running plex on two different NAS devices. A Terramaster F5-422 and a QNAP TS-932PX-4G. In doing so, both were running Plex but needed the user to browse content for each server separately. However, to get around this I built a pc for running ubuntu and plex server (I would have preferred not to have went to this for a solution). This meant I could map the drives on the ubuntu ‘server’ and combine the same content type into their combined library. So all movies from both NAS devices appear together and all tv shows etc. …
I appreciate that for some of us using plex we are using a device where we can type into plex to search for a film (tablet, pc or mobile). However, I think most of us are likely to browse from a firestick or similar connected to the tv for convenience and ubiquity. This means using a remote which has fewer buttons, basic direction control and select / cancel. Therefore, you are likely to scroll through content for inspiration rather than typing in a title.
I like your thinking here with the playback options. I always feel that the information listed is too limited for the playback settings. There’s no context just a data rate. No duration or source name listed. Which means you might have to click a few options before you get the right streaming option.
I’ve never understood the need for some users to have 101 libraries… Like, why have a library specifically dedicated to documentaries or anime, etc when those are genre categories you can filter for using a plain old Movies/TV library? I simply have a Movies library which houses my 1080p and 4K copies of movies using Editions and versions, then TV which I only go with 1080p or lower… No need for multiple servers or more than 1 library per media type.
Plex didn’t used to have as feature rich controls for managing aspects of movie libraries (at one point genre was even tricky to sort) and there’s a lot of historical use that just isn’t as necessary today after Plex evolved. Plex has kinda quietly pushed back on multiple libraries as it implemented new features and now kinda gears its apps to function best with as few libraries as possible.
The way navigating pinned libraries made browsing by library a very useful function, particularly when “Home Screen” wasn’t nearly as customizable or useful as it is today was a big one. Lots of genre break-outs were done this way so you could browse different genres easily and see them on Home Screen rows too. This is a primary reason New Experience feels so painful for many folks since it pretty much hides that quick navigation away.
Sharing - or more importantly restricting sharing - with users used to be primarily only library based and was a reason to have multiple libraries. Now you can use labels and ratings to restrict users but that wasn’t possible before so adult and kids movies often got their own libraries for that reason (and still used for that too since it’s a more blanket setup). That’s why you’ll see examples often talk about animation\family libraries.
Bandwidth\Transcoding controls. Internet (and home network) speeds used to be much lower and you’d want your standard def lower bitrate movies in a different library from your 4k high bitrate movies to make it easier to control buffering or triggering transcoding or flooding your internet\network connections. Again, another thing that’s less of a concern as cpu power and bandwidths have increased as well as more controls in Plex for making that less of a concern. Also, Plex does a pretty good job of automatically playing the right version (4k or 720p) for the client\bandwidth setup if the files are in the same library now.
If you consolidate a library it can be messy. Changing folders\files within a library doesn’t have much impact if you’re careful but changing libraries does, so being forced to change a long used system setup can be painful and a lot of work. It’d be easier for lots of folks if there was a way to “merge” programmatically.
