# Plex refusing to index music

**URL:** <https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-refusing-to-index-music/920714>\
**Category:** Metadata & Adding Files\
**Tags:** server-linux\
**Created:** [May 30, 2025, 6:55pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-refusing-to-index-music/920714 "2025-05-30T18:55:07Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![katie1273](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c77e96/32.png) [@katie1273](https://forums.plex.tv/u/katie1273)\
**Post date:** [May 30, 2025, 6:55pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-refusing-to-index-music/920714/1 "2025-05-30T18:55:07Z")

</div>

Server Version#: 1.41.7.9823  
Player Version#: 4.147.0

**Subject**  
I cannot seem to get plex to succesfully index music with any form of consistency with it only indexing a single song for a few random albums.

**Steps I have already done:**  
Confirm file structure and naming-  
Nirvana/Nevermind/01 - Smells Like Teen Spirit.mp3 exactly as is reccomended by plex  
Confirm file permissions-

 ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/plex/original/4X/6/2/f/62fa39e63aca4d03ace75e6cfb005ad7d82608ba.png)  
The “Plex” user is part of the “media” group  
Confirm file metadata-  
Use picard to generate it and uploaded those files back to the server  
 ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/plex/original/4X/e/9/1/e91dfe99c7e0e6772afdb6d2f25130f53385555b.png)

**Plex’s current output**  
Plex currently indexes a single song from the album as is seen here:

 ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/plex/original/4X/b/2/7/b275736e7b82b8c728f55f15115e2ecfb2e39f05.jpeg)

When scanning the library plex shows it is adding files to the scanner indicating it can definitely view the files

 ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/plex/original/4X/7/f/6/7f69d97446f51dbde911baba5a8af5fa189d49ca.jpeg)

```auto
VERBOSE - Adding file for scanner: "/library/lidatube/Nirvana/Nevermind/01 - Smells Like Teen Spirit.mp3"

```

```auto
DEBUG - Directory had 13 files, database had 0 files, can't skip.

```

```auto
VERBOSE - It took 0.0 sec to serialize a partial list with 0 elements (0 total).

```

From my understanding it is seeing the files and just not adding them. Heres an example of their metadata

 ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/plex/original/4X/9/1/4/9140775c01237e6d414273cd2a455775d8047969.png)

Any advice would be appreciated and I can provide additional information if wanted.  
Thanks in advance, kate!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![katie1273](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c77e96/32.png) [@katie1273](https://forums.plex.tv/u/katie1273)\
**Post date:** [May 30, 2025, 7:11pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-refusing-to-index-music/920714/2 "2025-05-30T19:11:39Z")

</div>

I just managed to solve my own issue. While searching for other users with similar problems i stumbled accross this post [Unable to add music](https://forums.plex.tv/t/unable-to-add-music/795412) where they were also unable to download the logs zip because of their temp directory.

My exact issue was in my docker compose I mount the direction plex\_temp like this

```auto
  plex:
    container_name: plex
    image: binhex/arch-plex
    network_mode: host
    environment:
      - PUID=1004
      - PGID=1001
      - UMASK=002
      - TZ=Europe/London
      - TRANS_DIR=/transcode
    volumes:
      - ./plex:/config
      - ./plex_temp:/transcode

```

This plex\_temp directory had the complete wrong permissions and was not owned by the plex user as it was meant to be. Changing the owner of the directory allows music to index and also solved my logs not downloading.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/plex/original/3X/2/a/2acb9765406f63293d357b4ec509ec39aa28f2ad.png) [@system](https://forums.plex.tv/u/system)\
**Post date:** [August 28, 2025, 7:11pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-refusing-to-index-music/920714/3 "2025-08-28T19:11:56Z")

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