# Plex stuck on creating thumbnails (FFmpeg issue) **URL:** \ **Category:** Plex Media Server\ **Tags:** server-linux\ **Created:** [May 17, 2021, 1:00am UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251 "2021-05-17T01:00:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Ari](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Ari](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Ari)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2021, 10:41pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/21 "2021-10-01T22:41:12Z")
Bump.​ ---
**Author:** ![Ari](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Ari](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Ari)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2021, 3:04am UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/22 "2021-12-03T03:04:08Z")
Bump.​ ---
**Author:** ![Ari](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Ari](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Ari)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2022, 2:57pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/23 "2022-03-01T14:57:29Z")
Bump. ---
**Author:** ![Mitzsch](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/plex/user_avatar/forums.plex.tv/mitzsch/32/308163_2.png) [@Mitzsch](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Mitzsch)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2022, 5:01pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/24 "2022-04-08T17:01:44Z")
Just want to bump this as well but also wanted to say that I tried different software to see how fast (and reliable) video preview thumbnails creation could be done. I tried [GitHub - justjanne/media-ingestion: A proof of concept for a tool to generate hover-seek previews of media files as well as extracting metadata, written in Rust](https://github.com/justjanne/media-ingestion) as it was suggested and disclosed as being “a lot faster than the plex one” by a jellyfin dev on reddit. And well it is not faster, for 4K content it’s even exactly as slow/fast as plex is… (and generates multiple pictures into one giant picture, not in individual pictures that are merged into a BIF file as plex does) For 4K movies maybe the video preview thumbnail “package” of the 1080p version (if available) could be used? Many of us keep a 1080p and a 4K version of the same movie, so why create thumbnails for both versions, where one could be generated relatively quickly and the other takes ages to complete? I have no idea how easily this could be implemented but I don´t know why not. btw - I hope this was not that off topic! (: ---
**Author:** ![Volts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/a5b964/32.png) [@Volts](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Volts)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2022, 6:49pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/25 "2022-04-08T18:49:01Z")
I wouldn’t expect that tool to be meaningfully faster. Internally it uses `ffmpeg` … just like Plex. The trouble with using thumbnails from a different file is that the other file may not be exactly the same. DVD vs. Blu-ray - the editions might have different intros, different aspect ratios, and scenes could be added or removed or cut differently. How long are these taking to process on your system? ---
**Author:** ![Mitzsch](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/plex/user_avatar/forums.plex.tv/mitzsch/32/308163_2.png) [@Mitzsch](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Mitzsch)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2022, 8:32am UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/26 "2022-04-09T08:32:28Z")
> [@Volts](#): > > Internally it uses `ffmpeg` … just like Plex. Yeah, just wanted to test if it could be faster, even though it uses ffmpeg internally… > [@Volts](#): > > DVD vs. Blu-ray - the editions might have different intros, different aspect ratios, and scenes could be added or removed or cut differently. DVD vs BD Files are really different for sure. (25fps vs 24fps) But 1080p and 4K movies? Maybe they are some seconds off but in general, they should be the same? (Well only if they are the same cut version… A different cut should be as a separate movie in your library! 😉 ) > [@Volts](#): > > How long are these taking to process on your system? DVD is really fast, BD takes 5-8 Minutes and 4K Stuff takes 30 to 40 Minutes. (it uses 12 (out of 40) cores for doing that) (I also have `GenerateBIFKeyframesOnly="0"` set in the Preferences.xml) ---
**Author:** ![Volts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/a5b964/32.png) [@Volts](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Volts)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2022, 10:14pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/27 "2022-04-09T22:14:50Z")
Agreed, different cuts should be split, but that’s just one reason. It’s also just simpler to have a 1 → 1 relationship of files → previews. That’s really slow. Are you using `GenerateBIFKeyframesOnly="0"` because you have media where it’s required? ---
**Author:** ![Mitzsch](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/plex/user_avatar/forums.plex.tv/mitzsch/32/308163_2.png) [@Mitzsch](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Mitzsch)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2022, 3:00pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/28 "2022-04-10T15:00:39Z")
> [@Volts](#): > > Are you using `GenerateBIFKeyframesOnly="0"` because you have media where it’s required? Yes, without GenerateBIFKeyframesOnly=“0” being set, plex fails to create video preview thumbnails on some media. ---
**Author:** ![Volts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/a5b964/32.png) [@Volts](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Volts)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2022, 3:40pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/29 "2022-04-10T15:40:28Z")
Can you share some samples? Is the media with problems from the same source? ---
**Author:** ![Mitzsch](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/plex/user_avatar/forums.plex.tv/mitzsch/32/308163_2.png) [@Mitzsch](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Mitzsch)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2022, 10:41am UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/30 "2022-04-11T10:41:38Z")
> [@Volts](#): > > Can you share some samples? Well, not really, unfortunately, they all have copyright and so on. But most of the files that are affected I already described above in this thread. (MediaInfo output) > [@Volts](#): > > Is the media with problems from the same source? They all are from (different) 1080p BluRays. Some are from the same publisher. With 4K media, I never had problems with plex being stuck on creating video previews. ---
**Author:** ![Ari](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Ari](https://forums.plex.tv/u/Ari)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2022, 8:39am UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/31 "2022-05-23T08:39:31Z")
Continuation: [Plex stuck on creating thumbnails (FFmpeg issue)](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/808985) ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/plex/original/3X/2/a/2acb9765406f63293d357b4ec509ec39aa28f2ad.png) [@system](https://forums.plex.tv/u/system)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2022, 8:40am UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/plex-stuck-on-creating-thumbnails-ffmpeg-issue/716251/32 "2022-08-21T08:40:29Z")
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