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RulerOf/plex-streaming-quality-settings.md

Last active October 16, 2023 03:53
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Adjusting Plex Media Player streaming quality defaults and per-stream
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plex-streaming-quality-settings.md

Setting a default quality in Plex Media Player desktop

The Plex Media Player desktop application's default quality setting is in different places depending on the interface you're using. The Plex Web UI is used as a point-and-click interface, whereas the Plex Media Player TV UI is used as a remote-friendly interface.

Plex Web UI Plex Media Player TV UI
Plex Web UI Plex Media Player TV UI

Want to change quality for a single playback session? Skip down to Troubleshooting.

Plex Web UI Default Quality Settings

  1. If you don't know how much bandwidth you have, visit https://fast.com and it'll tell you.

  2. Click Settings up in the top-right corner.

settings

  1. Click Quality in the left-hand navigation menu.

Quality

  1. Choose a default quality that's better than the stock configuration of 2 Mbps. For the bandwidth-impaired, keep this number below 80% of your max speed. For everyone else, I suggest 8, 10, or 12 Mbps.

Bandwidth

  1. Ensure that Play smaller videos at original quality is checked, and then click SAVE CHANGES.

Plex Media Player TV UI Default Quality Settings

  1. If you don't know how much bandwidth you have, visit https://fast.com and it'll tell you.

  2. Highlight and then select, or click on your user portrait.

Portrait

  1. Open Settings.

Settings

  1. In settings, open Video, then Remote Quality.

Video > Remote Quality

  1. In Remote Quality, choose a default quality that's better than the stock configuration of 2 Mbps. For the bandwidth-impaired, keep this number below 80% of your max speed. For everyone else, I suggest 8, 10, or 12 Mbps.

Bandwidth

Troubleshooting

Get lots of stops/starts, or buffering a lot? Try lowering the quality. To temporily adjust quality for a single playback session, follow these steps.

Plex Web UI Plex Media Player TV UI
Plex Web UI Plex Media Player TV UI

Plex Web UI Single-Session Quality Adjustment

  1. Open the playback Settings for the video you're watching.

Playback settings

  1. Click on the current playback quality and choose a new one from the list.

Adjust quality

Plex TV UI Single-Session Quality Adjustment

  1. Navigate to the onscreen settings icon while your video is playing and click or select it.

Playback settings

  1. Select/click Quality from the list of settings, and then choose and quality from the list and select/click on it, then back out of the settings menu.

Select quality

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plexweb-2_quality-entry.png
@BlaM
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BlaM commented Feb 13, 2022

@RulerOf That's actually an interesting idea. I'm using a Philips TV also running with Android TV. The NIC you used seems to be unavailable here in Germany, but that hint with ChromeOS should be enough for me to find something. Thank You! 😃

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