The scanners and metadata agents used by Plex will work best when your major types of content are separated from each other. We strongly recommend separating movie and television content into separate main directories. For instance, you might use something like this:

/Media
   /Movies
      movie content
   /Music
      music content
   /TV Shows
      television content

Warning!: Plex will do its best to appropriately find and match content. However, a failure to separate content such as movies and TV shows may result in unexpected or incorrect behavior.

You might have your own image files for movie posters & backgrounds, subtitles, your own movie “extras”, etc. To use these, ensure they are named and organized, and that the Local Media Assets source is enabled and ordered correctly.

Enable Local Assets Plex Movie Agent

If using the new Plex Movie agent you only need to enable “Use local Assets” in the libraries advanced settings

Related Page: Advanced settings Plex Movie Agent

Enable “Local Media Assets” (Legacy Agents)

if using the legacy Personal Media, Plex Movie (Legacy) or The Movie Database agents”Local Media Assets” is an Agent source that loads local media files or embedded metadata for a media item. To do this, ensure the Agent source is enabled and topmost in the list:

• Launch the Plex Web App
• Choose Settings from the top right of the Home screen
• Select your Plex Media Server from the settings sidebar
• Choose Agents
• Choose the Library Type and Agent you want to change
• Ensure Local Media Assets is checked
• Ensure Local Media Assets is topmost in the list

Related Page: Metadata Agents

Local Artwork Assets

Supported Artwork Image Formats

There are a number of supported custom media items that need to be named correctly so they are detected. The supported image file formats are:

• jpg
• jpeg
• png
• tbn

Poster Artwork

Posters are typically displayed for movies on Plex app dashboards, library views, and when looking at details for the movie. Poster art is typically of 1:1.5 aspect ratio. Custom Poster artwork will be detected and used if named and stored as follows:

• MovieName (Release Date).ext or
• Movie/MovieName (Release Date)/Custom_Poster_Name.ext

Where Custom_Poster_Name is:

• cover
• default
• folder
• movie
• poster

…and ext is the file extension. (Some operating systems such as Windows may hide your file extensions by default.)

/Movies
   /Batman Begins (2005)
      Batman Begins (2005).mkv
      poster.jpg

Multiple Poster Images

More than one poster image can be included. The poster used can be selected in the Plex Web App. For multiple items to be scanned, they should be named as follows:

• Custom_Poster_Name-X.ext

Where -X is a number

/Movies
   /Avatar (2009)
      Avatar (2009).mkv
      poster.jpg
      poster-2.png
   Batman Begins (2005).mkv
   Batman Begins (2005)-1.jpg
   Batman Begins (2005)-2.tbn

Background (Fanart) Artwork

Background art is often displayed in the background when looking at the details page for a movie. It can also be used in the background elsewhere or for a slideshow or screensaver. Background art typically uses a 16:9 aspect ratio. Local background artwork or “fanart” can be specified as follows:

• MovieName (Release Date)-fanart.ext or
• Movies/MovieName (Release Date)/Custom_Fanart_Name.ext

/Movies
   Avatar (2009)-fanart.jpg
   Avatar (2009).mkv

/Movies
   /Avatar (2009)
      Avatar (2009).mkv
      fanart.jpg

/Movies
   /Avatar (2009)
      Avatar (2009).mkv
      fanart.jpg
      fanart-2.png
   Batman Begins (2005).mkv
   Batman Begins (2005)-fanart-1.jpg
   Batman Begins (2005)-fanart-2.tbn

/Movies
   Avatar (2009).mkv
   Avatar (2009).en.srt

/Movies
   /Avatar (2009)
      Avatar (2009).mkv
      Avatar (2009).eng.ass

Local Trailers and Extras

If you have trailers, interviews, behind the scenes videos, or other “extras” type content for your movies, you can add those.

Related Page: Local Files for Movie Trailers and Extras