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Recommended naming scheme

Often on the Sonarr Discord people ask what's the recommended/best way to name your files. First off it's personal preference, but it's often recommended to add non-recoverable info.

Why?

If, for whatever reason, you ever need to do a re-install or re-import in Sonarr or Plex/Emby/JellyFin it's nice to have all that info in the filename so it gets imported correctly and isn't incorrectly matched as HDTV or WEB-DL etc.

The Tokens not available in the release won't be used/shown.


Standard Episode Format

All the details

{Series TitleYear} - S{season:00}E{episode:00} - {Episode CleanTitle} [{Preferred Words }{Quality Full}]{[MediaInfo VideoDynamicRange]}[{MediaInfo VideoBitDepth}bit]{[MediaInfo VideoCodec]}{[Mediainfo AudioCodec}{ Mediainfo AudioChannels]}{MediaInfo AudioLanguages}{-Release Group}
RESULTS:

Single Episode:

The Series Title! (2010) - S01E01 - Episode Title 1 [AMZN WEBDL-1080p Proper][HDR][10bit][x264][DTS 5.1]-RlsGrp

Multi Episode:

The Series Title! (2010) - S01E01-E02-E03 - Episode Title [AMZN WEBDL-1080p Proper][HDR][10bit][x264][DTS 5.1]-RlsGrp

Minimal details + the irreplaceable data

{Series Title} S{season:00}E{episode:00} {[Quality Title]}{[MediaInfo AudioCodec}{ MediaInfo AudioChannels]}{[MediaInfo VideoCodec]}{-Release Group}
RESULTS:

Single Episode:

The Series Title! S01E01 [HDTV-720p][DTS 5.1][x264]-RlsGrp

Multi Episode:

The Series Title! S01E01-E02-E03 [HDTV-720p][DTS 5.1][x264]-RlsGrp


Daily Episode Format

All the details

{Series TitleYear} - {Air-Date} - {Episode CleanTitle} [{Preferred Words }{Quality Full}]{[MediaInfo VideoDynamicRange]}[{MediaInfo VideoBitDepth}bit]{[MediaInfo VideoCodec]}{[Mediainfo AudioCodec}{ Mediainfo AudioChannels]}{MediaInfo AudioLanguages}{-Release Group}
RESULTS:

The Series Title! (2010) - 2013-10-30 - Episode Title 1 [AMZN WEBDL-1080p Proper][HDR][10bit][x264][DTS 5.1]-RlsGrp

Minimal details + the irreplaceable data

{Series Title} - {Air-Date} - {Episode CleanTitle} {[Quality Title]}{[MediaInfo AudioCodec}{ MediaInfo AudioChannels]}{[MediaInfo VideoCodec]}{-Release Group}
RESULTS:

The Series Title! - 2013-10-30 - Episode Title 1 [HDTV-720p][DTS 5.1][x264]-RlsGrp


Anime Episode Format

All the details

{Series TitleYear} - S{season:00}E{episode:00} - {absolute:000} - {Episode CleanTitle} [{Preferred Words }{Quality Full}]{[MediaInfo VideoDynamicRange]}[{MediaInfo VideoBitDepth}bit]{[MediaInfo VideoCodec]}[{Mediainfo AudioCodec} { Mediainfo AudioChannels}]{MediaInfo AudioLanguages}{-Release Group}
RESULTS:

Single Episode:

The Series Title! (2010) - S01E01 - 001 - Episode Title 1 [iNTERNAL HDTV-720p v2][HDR][10bit][x264][DTS 5.1][JA]-RlsGrp

Multi Episode:

The Series Title! (2010) - S01E01-E02-E03 - 001-002-003 - Episode Title [iNTERNAL HDTV-720p v2][HDR][10bit][x264][DTS 5.1][JA]-RlsGrp

Minimal details + the irreplaceable data

{Series Title} - S{season:00}E{episode:00} - {absolute:000} - {[Quality Title]}[{Mediainfo AudioCodec} { Mediainfo AudioChannels}]{[MediaInfo VideoCodec]}{-Release Group}
RESULTS:

Single Episode:

The Series Title! - S01E01 - 001 - [HDTV-720p][DTS 5.1][x264]-RlsGrp

Multi Episode:

The Series Title! - S01E01-E02-E03 - 001-002-003 - [HDTV-720p][DTS 5.1][x264]-RlsGrp


Series Folder Format

{Series TitleYear}

RESULT:

The Series Title! (2010)

Optional Series Folder Format for the Plex TV Series Scanner and Jellyfin/Emby

This naming scheme is made to be compatible with the New Plex TV Series Scanner that now support IMDB and TVDB IDs in file names.

For Plex:

{Series TitleYear} [imdb-{ImdbId}]

RESULT:

The Series Title! (2010) [imdb-tt1520211]

Note

The officially supported format is {imdb-{ImdbId}} but plex should also support (imdb-{ImdbId}) or [imdb-{ImdbId}], though the above should work for now, It's actually not needed to add a ID to the folder or filename to use the New Plex TV Series Scanner.

For Jellyfin/Emby:

{Series TitleYear} [imdbid-{ImdbId}]

RESULT:

The Series Title! (2010) [imdbid-tt1520211]

Tip

IMDb IDs are going to be very accurate and rarely change, TVDB/TMDB IDs, on the other hand, do change or are removed more frequently.


Season Folder Format

For this there's only one real option to use in my opinion.

Season {season:00}

RESULT:

Season 01


Multi-Episode Style

Scene

RESULTS:

results


Original Title vs Original Filename

Want to keep the original release name that holds like all the info of the file then I suggest to use {Original Title} over {Original Filename}

Why?

The filename can be Obscured where the Release naming isn't especially when you use Usenet.

{Original Title} => The.Series.Title.S01E01.Episode.Title.1080p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-RlsGrp

{Original Filename} => show episode 1-1080p or lchd-tkk1080p or t1i0p3s7i8yuti


Thanks:

A big Thanks to fryfrog, rg9400 and bakerboy448 for the suggestions.


Questions or Suggestions?

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Last update: December 29, 2021 06:15:01
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