How to Add Movies

Did you ever wonder how to add movies to Plex? The good news is that the process is easy, and requires only a few steps. The other good news is that the process is very similar to adding TV shows or adding music to a Plex server.

Use the following step-by-step guide for adding movies to Plex.

How to add movies to Plex

Before you can add any movie to Plex, ensure you follow the Plex movie naming conventions and folder structure. Once your movies are organized properly, you can now add them to your Plex server.

You can use the following steps to manually add movies to a Plex library:

1. Open a Web browser and navigate to your Plex server.
2. Log into your Plex server as an administrator.
3. Click the Settings - the wrench - link in the upper-right corner of the Plex server page.
4. From the menu on left, scroll down to the Manage section and click the Libraries option.

   

5. With the Libraries page displayed on the right, click the Add Library button. The Add Library window is displayed.
6. Select the Films library type.
7. Enter a name for your library. You can leave it as "Films" or change it to something you prefer. You can also change the language.
8. To continue, click the Next button.

   

9. To select the folder containing your movies, click the Browse for Media Folder button.

   

10. Navigate and then select the folder containing the movies. Click the Add button to add the folder to the library.

    

11. Click the Add Library button.

    

The movie library has now been created on your Plex server. If you move your mouse over the library name, the Edit Library option will become visible. This option allows you to modify settings for your library.

You may find that once you added the library, Plex may not display the information about your movies. This may also be the case if you add new movies to your library.

If the information for your movies isn't available in Plex, you will need to tell Plex to scan your library files. The next section explains how to have plex scan your library files.

Scan movie library files

Once the movie library is created, you can scan the movie files for the library. Scanning the library will search the movie folders and download the metadata for each of the episodes of the movie.

The amount of time it takes to scan the library is dependent on the number of movies you added to your Plex Media Server. Of course, the more movies that need to be scanned, the longer it will take to scan and download the metadata for the shows.

To scan the movie library in Plex, do the following:

1. Log into your Plex server as an administrator.
2. Move your mouse cursor over the movie library in the library list in the left menu.
3. Click the three dots that appear, and then select Scan Library Files from the menu that appears.

   

At this point, Plex will scan the movie files and download the metadata and other information for each of the movies. If you organized the movies properly, then there shouldn't be too many issues with downloading the correct data.

If you have included additional files or folders you don't want Plex to scan, you can easily have Plex ignore those files and folders.

The above steps outline how to add movies to Plex. Once the movie folders and files have been scanned by Plex, the movies will be available for streaming.

If the data for all your movies was not downloaded correctly, or if the movies are not showing up, there are a few things you can try:

1. Check the naming conventions for your movies to ensure they are what Plex expects.
2. Include the IMDB ID number in the movie's folder name. This will let the Plex agents know the exact movie they should use for the data.
3. Try reading and then scanning the library again.

Usually one of the above solutions should help with incorrect data for a movie.