This is quite similar to UKenGB’s Music metadata thread, but this is a specific request for documentation.
I have a music collection composed of MP3s and FLACs. I’ve used a number of different pieces of software over the decades so before I ingest this collection into a PMS, I want to cleanse the tags so they are all present and correct.
I intend to use Python’s Mutagen library to carry this cleansing out, but I’m trying to work out what I am aiming for before I begin. From reading other posts I gather that Plex handles ID3v2 tags in MP3 files and Vorbis comments in FLACs so that’s fine. But does anyone know of a comprehensive list of
which tags Plex reads for each format
what Plex does with each of these tags
and which of these Plex will attempt to modify (so I can verify those fields are still ‘correct’ post-import).
Beckfield’s request contains a good start. Can we have a response from Plex?
Tags that Plex currently supports are marked with
Partially-supported tags marked with
Items that need to be added marked with
TALB
Album/Movie/Show title
TCOM
Composer [multiple names separated by “/”] [Absolutely indispensable for classical music]
TCON
Content type [genre] [Needs to be on a per-TRACK basis] - [multiple genres (more than two) separated by “/”]
TDOR
Original release time
TDRC
Recording time [especially meaningful for classical music] (Plex uses this for “originally available at”)
TDRL
Release time
TIT1
Content group description (See detailed description below)
TIT2
Title/songname/content description [movement] (See detailed description below)
TIT3
Subtitle/Description refinement (See detailed description below)
TLAN
Language(s)
TPE1
Lead performer(s)/Soloist(s) [multiple names separated by “/”]
TPE2
Band/orchestra/accompaniment [especially meaningful for classical music] (Plex is actually misusing the TPE2 tag for ‘Album Artist.’ See additional comments below.)
TPE3
Conductor/performer refinement [especially meaningful for classical music]
TPOS
Part of a set [“2” for disc 2, or “2/4” if disc 2 of 4]
TSST
Set Subtitle - Useful for box sets, audiobooks, collections
Keep in mind that Plex doesn’t support Artwork, Genre, Release Date per track but only per album.
Several values for one tag are also not supported. They are silently discarded and only the first one is used (e.g. Genre, Artist etc.)
Plex doesn’t modify your files at all.
In ID3 tags, stick to ID3v2.3 with UTF-16 encoding.
In Plex, it is very important to have the metatag for Album Artist to be present.
See the supported meta tags in this screen shot.
It also gives a good example of the necessary folder structure, which is also very important in Plex:
Thanks Otto. A few clarifications would be helpful.
discs must be in sub-directory each (as per screenshot) or are they OK in a single directory (for example named disc#-track#) so long as the part-of-set (e.g. TPOS) field is correctly set?
Keep in mind that Plex doesn’t support Artwork, Genre, Release Date per track but only per album .
so embedded artwork is ignored? image files within the album’s base directory? any restrictions on quantity/size/formats?
does artwork get downloaded automatically to the directory?
where would we store genre and release date information? Or does it work along the lines of metadata from first-file applies to the whole album?
Plex doesn’t modify your files at all.
For some reason I thought Plex had metadata editor that modified files. Does it only modify data in the Plex SQLite db or does no such editing functionality exist?
Plex appears to support multiple values for genre. At least, it always has for me.
Individual tracks can even have different and/or multiple genres than other tracks on the same album. The various genres are then all amalgamated for the entire album, but no genre appears to be stored for the tracks, as mentioned.
They are OK in a common folder, as long as the embedded meta tags are complete and correctly populated.
It is not ignored, but you will only see one common picture for all tracks of an album.
Is my recommendation. A separate image file allows you to use a higher resolution and file size, which would be insane to embed.
I used up to 3000px large files.
Restrict yourself to PNG and JPG files. (Some other formats are supported as well, but I don’t have the full list at hand.)
Plex doesn’t modify your files nor does it change anything in the folder where your media files are.
All external information and artwork which may be fetched by Plex goes into the Plex database and the Plex data folder.
Keep them consistent in all tracks of one album. That way you don’t need to know which track will determine these values for the whole album.
(I can’t tell you either, sorry!)
You might wanna experiment a bit with the content of the Genre tags.
