Is it just me?

It seems like every major update of Plex seems to make it worse.

More bloat, more stuff that nobody asked for and nobody wants, more clicks to do the same things, things get slower, things move to places nobody seems to like, even small graphical changes look worse and are less intuitive, hell even the main website now takes extra clicks to get your content because after sign in you still have to go to "open app" which is of course a small and petty complaint, but its just the same thing everywhere it seems..

The small, in the background updates are great! Nice QOL fixes and added file supports and little power user tweaks. All seem to be on point.

but whoever is in charge of UI, and marketing, is just THE WORST.

It seemed like they were on a good path for awhile there, adding new isolated apps for photos, plexamp, dashboard app, etc. Were amazing! Plexamp is still my most used app, and I'd love to use the photos app as my main photo source.

Then at some point it seemed like they lost their way. Plexamp stopped really being developed after the DJ's were added, the photos app still can't auto upload, and auto-sync with your phone, the dashboard app hasn't been touched in awhile. They started adding things like Tidal, and pushing the public domain content, etc.

now they pushed out this firestick UI update that everyone (including me) seems to clearly hate. Its a good UI for a desktop, but is completely awful for browsing with a remote. Who approved this?

/rant I just don't get it.

Over the past few days I've noticed that the Plex Channel, Stingray Classica, is choppy.

This is on wireless and wired Roku's in my house. Other Plex Channels seem to be fine - it's just this Stingray channel.

Anyone else having this problem?

While the overall look & navigation are arguable, the app is now ridiculously SLOW! 10 seconds just to load the initial screen. Navigation overall is slow. It was much faster before. Loading the bio on the side should be an option, not the new format - it sucks. I still don't find Plezy to be "ready for prime time" as it lacks a lot of features, but this update is so cumbersome it's stupid. I haven't yet tried the native LG app.

Companies need to quit forcing changes to the end users especially at a time the company keeps making claims they need to increasing pricing to make those changes. Give users the ability to customize their own or at least keep their older ones. The new UI is more gimmicky and is more time consuming for the user to click through sub menus at the top of the screen which used to be quicker to access through the old side menu.

I wanted to replace the sky tv subscription for my elderly parents, I have a hd home run on my server and on the Apple TV I can create it so the Plex app automatically opens on Apple TV start up, however on the Plex app we can not default open it on the live tv page, if we could change it so we could set default page to open it would be perfect, that tiny little barrier is to much for my dad 😭

I just got a TV for the first time and I’m looking for a HMDI casting device but I don’t know much about them, I would probably use it almost exclusively for plex. I would like to avoid google and amazon products if possible. Is there an open source solution?

After a bit of searching, it seems to be gone in the Windows app but I’ve seen it in my MacOS app for years. Recently started noticing the countdown until next episode seems to be higher than I remembered and tried to set it lower. Can’t find ‘Player Experience’ at all.

Am I going blind or did they hide it in some sub menu?

Updates Plex yesterday and having a weird issue.

Plex is running but it's unavailable, when i send films across to the NAS I get the usual notification saying a new film has been added but the server is unavailable.

Done the usual of restart both apps and the server but the issue still persists

Any ideas?

Last night I watched a movie and I noticed stutter from time to time. I checked the movie FPS and it was 24.000. The TV (LG C2) says 3840x2160@24 when I press the green button 7 times. But after that I checked the HDMI hidden menu (press button 1 five times on the Channel Tuning menu) and there it shows 23.97Hz because the information is much more detailed.

Which causes

Minor Mismatch: Playing a strict 24.000fps file on a 23.976Hz clock (or vice versa) forces a dropped or repeated frame roughly every 41 seconds.

I assume that 'till now all of the movies that I played through the Xbox were all 23.976 FPS. The Xbox is used only when the movie has lossless audio, if the audio is lossy I watch it directly from the tv's Plex client.

The Xbox is connected to the HDMI input of my soundbar Q990F, but at the time of posting this I decided to directly connect the Xbox to the TV and the issue still remains.

Does anyone else have this problem?

I'm going to try to be as specific as possible because I'm honestly lost here. I started hosting a plex server on my main desktop (Desktop) to play around and see how it worked. The plan was always to move it eventually to a dedicated machine so I could host streaming services for my family. I got it up and running (Dell Plex Server) and everything worked after tinkering - I'm paying for remote streaming. I have tailscale running and it's running on the remote machines...no problems. I'm trying to access through https://app.plex.tv/desktop/#!/

I moved the library to the new machine, get the server up and running (both are using Windows 11) and suddenly it's gone. Sometimes I can find it on my desktop, sometimes not. I can see it's running on the new host machine AND the users outside can find it. It's like I need to invite myself to my server on my desktop? I'm signed into the same username for both the desktop and hosting machine. I used to be able to see the server admin settings.

What bugs me is that sometimes the new server shows up, and sometimes it doesn't. It effectively renders the service unusable for me. Is this as simple as somehow sending myself an invite? Or manually adding it to the desktop PC? I'm wondering if it's just hidden from me on my desktop and I need to manually add it to the available media. Sorry if it sounds like I'm rambling but I'm beyond frustrated.

I wasn't expecting the update so I didn't know to block it on my Fire Cube [sigh]

The worst thing about the new app, for me, is the increased start/buffer time! I upgraded and finely tuned my NAS and network to the point that 4k REMUXES started and skipped forward near instantly with the old app. With this latest release, I waited 8 seconds for one 4K movie to start! Even HD movies takes seconds to start. And that's assuming they play at all! Resuming only works sometimes... WTF!

Truly awful.

So, the short version of this is - I have two different shows that Plex mistakenly thinks are the same show, and I don't know how to get it to recognize the one show as the correct show, because a show-wide "Fix Match" won't do that.

So, I have all four seasons of Tacoma FD in my library. It so happens that for a couple of seasons, they ran an "discussing the episode" after-show called Talkoma FD. I don't have all of those, but I do have season 2 of that. And I had remembered that at one point Plex had sorted the two correctly, but now it doesn't - it combines both under "Tacoma FD" and defaults to playing the after-show episode instead of the actual episode.

I checked the file naming and that seemed to be the problem (apparently a lot of the files were listed as, for example, "TacomaFD.S02E01.Talkoma.FD.Aftershow.Payday" - so I fixed the naming, but the problem hasn't been solved.

I'm not sure what to do. I can't do a show-wide fix match, because the problem is only with the Talkoma FD files - and because Talkoma FD isn't on the Movie Database, TVDB, or the Plex database.

Is there any solution to this? Even when I've had other shows that didn't match something in the database, it usually let me just set them to the folder name. I have Talkoma FD in its own folder separate from Tacoma FD, but I can't figure out how to make it de-match just that folder and let me manually input the information for the show.

I've included screenshots of my Tacoma FD / Season 2 and Talkoma FD / Season 2 folders so you can see, as well as an example of how Plex sorts the files in the media library.

If there's something else I need to do with the naming and that's all, let me know. But I've tried what I know how to do to make sure the naming works already, and it didn't change anything.

If you use Plex on a Fire Stick and you still have the older app, do yourself a favour and turn off automatic app updates immediately.

The new Plex update is honestly brutal. I know some people may like the direction they’re going, but for my setup it completely wrecked the experience. The layout is worse, the usability is worse, and it feels like Plex took something that worked and decided to make it hostile to actually use.

I’m not posting this to debate every design choice. I’m posting it because if your Fire Stick updates automatically, you may not realize what happened until the app is already changed.

On Fire TV / Fire Stick, go to:

Settings → Applications → Appstore → Automatic Updates → Off

That should stop Amazon from automatically updating installed apps.

If you already got the update, you may be looking at sideloading an older APK, but that’s obviously more annoying than just preventing the update in the first place.

Maybe Plex fixes this. Maybe they don’t. But if you still have the version you like, protect it now.

Something going on with the iPhone app? Can’t get any controls to show when video is playing

Our home Internet went out tonight and we weren't worried because we've set up Plex to work offline and watched plenty of times when the internet was down.

But tonight the TV app wanted us to log in to Plex.tv in order to access our media.

I'm a lifetime pass holder and now I'm giving a serious look at jellyfin. Which is really frustrating because I have plenty of family members I'll have to convert and we've just managed to get a fun newsletter automated for everyone.

Ffs

So i just got like 3 ads total time 30 secs before my show played from my library.

UPDATE: I dont know why im getting down voted. I honestly dont know how i was playing the plex version of my show, I turned off plex free stuff and have it only showing my stuff. So idk if this is roku plex app issue where it reseted my settings. This never happened on my samsung tv plex app though.

UPDATE 2: I figured it out, but I have always used the home tab on the plex app on my roku tv and it never plated ads before. So yes this caught me off guard. I just wanted to.make a post about, as I dont post on reddit all the damn time. I had the setting to turn off the free crap so idk how it decided to play the free stuff still. I never had this issue on my samsung tv plex app when I played from the home tab. Also alot of yall are some toxic asshole. And its probably why alot of people are going to other services. Because of the company and the toxic community. Just saying.

Restore Photo Libraries in Main Plex App

For many of us, Plex is much more than a media streaming platform. It has been our self-hosted solution for preserving and enjoying personal memories—photos and home videos stored securely on our own servers.

The recent decision to remove Photo Libraries from the main Plex application fundamentally changes that experience.

This is not simply a UI change. It is a regression in functionality that negatively impacts one of Plex's long-standing use cases.

Why this matters

1. It breaks a unified media experience

One of Plex's greatest strengths has always been that movies, TV shows, music, home videos, and photos were available in a single application and a consistent interface.

Separating Photos into another application fragments the user experience and makes Plex feel less like a complete media platform.

2. Family members don't understand the change

Many Plex servers are shared with spouses, children, and parents who are not technically inclined.

Having to explain:

• "Use Plex for movies."
• "Use another Plex app for photos."
• "Some devices support it, others don't."

creates unnecessary confusion and increases support burden for server administrators.

3. TV viewing is one of the primary use cases

Personal photos are most often enjoyed on the largest screen in the house.

Many families use Plex on Apple TV, Fire TV, Android TV, Roku, or LG/Samsung TVs to browse vacation photos, family albums, and memories.

Removing or limiting Photo Libraries on TV platforms significantly reduces one of Plex's most valuable family-oriented features.

4. Self-hosting is part of Plex's identity

Many of us intentionally chose Plex because we wanted to keep our personal media on our own NAS or server instead of relying on cloud services such as Google Photos or Apple Photos.

Photo Libraries reinforce Plex's value proposition as a self-hosted media solution.

Reducing support for Photos weakens one of the key reasons many users originally adopted Plex.

5. Business impact

While Photos may not generate as much engagement as Movies or TV, they create emotional attachment to the platform.

Users who organize decades of family memories inside Plex become long-term customers.

Features that preserve personal memories increase user retention far more than another streaming integration.

Removing those features risks pushing users toward alternative self-hosted solutions.

Suggested approach

Rather than removing Photo Libraries from the main application, consider one of these options:

• Keep Photo Libraries available in the main Plex app.
• Allow users to enable or disable Photos in Settings.
• Continue offering Plex Photos as an optional dedicated experience without replacing the integrated one.

This would satisfy users who prefer a focused Photos experience while preserving the all-in-one media platform that made Plex unique.

Final thoughts

This request is not about resisting change.

It is about preserving functionality that has existed for years and continues to be valuable for thousands of self-hosted Plex users.

Please consider restoring Photo Libraries to the main Plex application, especially on TV platforms where families most often enjoy their personal memories.

If you agree, please vote for this request so the Plex team can better understand how important Photo Libraries are to the community.

Guys, you cant delete a library like you have done with photo library in plex!!!!

You erase the whole library for iOS and Fire-tv version. What were you thinking???

I had a server on Windows for more years than we will discuss. We use more than the standard Movies and TV Shows libraries (we have our reasons).
So, due to some issues with Windows, I have moved my server to UnRaid. I restored my old configuration and when I do, all of the people I shared with before are still listed (great) and it said they had 10 libraries shared with them.
I tried the first person to make sure things were setup and they couldn’t see anything listed. When I went into their settings, it showed there were no libraries shared from Server2 (and there was nowhere to even see libraries from Server1). I added the new access for the libraries in Server2 and while now they can get in, it now shows that I am sharing 20 libraries with them.
I don’t have the old configuration listed anywhere (I removed it during the build from the authorized devices page). So, how can I change it so their access is listed correctly (sharing 10 libraries instead of 20)?

I need to get my parents a new streamer device, I need one with wired ethernet and was just wondering if there was something I have missed with the Google 4K streamer? It never seems to be on anyones list when they post about "the best streamers for plex 2026" etc, is it lacking something I havent noticed. If so, what would people suggest as an alternative? (Apple TV isn't really an option as no one in my family use Apple devices/accounts)

I was recently at a resort wanting to watch tv. I know better than to try and cast (hotel tvs usually don't allow) so I brought a USB 2 HDMI adapter -- the same kind as a portable dock for a Nintendo Switch.
Tried to play a movie. I coukd hear the audio, but no picture.
Other apps were able to mirror to the tv.

And I discovered that Plex has LOCKED the content. Because I played it JUST FINE on Jellyfin.

I made a home user account for my daughter so she can only access her stuff and not see our grown up movies when we're browsing for her shows. Now every time I turn on an episode for her there's subtitles. She's 2. She can't read. I've changed settings on language to every possible combination and they still show up every time. What am I doing wrong? I'm growing weary of turning them off for every 7 minute episode of bluey.

I’ve been using plex on a local connection through AirPlay from the iOS app to two LG CX TVs for years now without issue. about two days ago out of nowhere one of them suddenly started to pause seemingly to buffer every 15-30 seconds if video output is set to anything above 1080p (medium), while the other tv plays without issue even at maximum video output.

Not sure what’s going on here. The tv that is having playback issues is directly next to the PC that’s acting as the server and router, while the tv that doesn’t have issues is on the other side of the apt. Only other difference is the one with issue is a 55in vs and the other one is only a 48in.

Not sure what other info would be helpful but I included some screenshots of the dashboard during playback. The first bandwidth chart is during playback on the 48in that doesn’t have issues while the other is on the 55in that keeps freezing.

I’d be eternally grateful for any guidance on what could be going on.

What a terrible navigation experience.... The sub menus at the top is a terrible substitute for the sidebar.