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iOS app is not well designed
I have owned Plex for about 4-5 years now, and the media server is great. It’s very easy to set up and manage. The iOS app, however, is not very good. As an example, it does not sync music very well. I had all my music synced to my phone; then one day it was all gone. No error message or notification of what had happened. 5000 songs were deleted off my phone. Syncing has been problematic since day one. The other problem is with the UI. The buttons are tiny, even on an iPhone XS. They tried to cram too much on the screen and made the play and pause buttons so small I have to have my glasses on to see them. Since it doesn’t integrate with Siri well, I have to pull over if I want to search for songs while I’m driving. Playlists also don’t sync between devices so I have to set up new lists on each one. In my opinion, the whole app needs a complete redesign. I’ve tried to make it work, but I’m going to be looking for another app to use to play my music on my phone.Show lessDatawrangler
Flakey and invasive
I want to like this app and the Plex server, I really do. After all I paid good money for both when first impressions/tests were good. Since then there have been many updates, and it has been more frustrating than usable.
Having some experience debugging both software and network issues, I’ve spent way too much time trying to understand what this app is doing or rather failing to do, which causes it to frequently stall or not even connect to the server within our home network. Time I would have rather spent actually enjoying our media.
My #1 complaint is that it stalls or buffers so much that it is unusable. Our LAN and all devices are plenty fast so congestion or speed of connectivity isn’t the problem.
#2 WOW! This app calls home a lot. I think that might actually be the root of the problems. It even authenticates with an external service when all we want is for it to play local content.
UI wise, it looks nice, but ultimately it needs to be able to play our content. For that we found MrMC, which is just superb and rock solid. Plus, MrMC seems to respect user privacy and rarely makes external requests... if ever.
Regardless I keep revisiting this app to see if updates have made it more usable because the UI is nice, and because I paid so much for it. As of sept. 23, 2018, it still stalls on most content, while the same files play perfectly in MrMC.😑Show lessMarkdown Pro
No forced subtitles
App is great but when streaming movies from Plex server to a device (let’s say Apple TV 4K Plex app) any subtitles that are forced (language translation for example) don’t play. The Plex app doesn’t even recognise them as a thing. All you can do is manually select the normal subtitles by manually leaving the movie. This is pretty crippling. If this issue was resolved it would be an immediate 5 Star review! I have found loads of complaints about similar things on the Plex Forums.
Come on Plex! Fix this major issue please!Show lessLunnzies
Would have been a 5 before
I spent a lot of time organizing my library and now it’s frustrating as all get out to get to my content. Please add an ALL option and not just an All for TV, Movies and Music. Plex just became unusable for me. I’ve been using Plex from almost the beginning back when it was Mac only. I was one of the first people to sign up for a lifetime pass. Please don’t make me regret this. I don’t want to use a different client to view my content but it looks like I’m going to need to until they fix this problem.
I’m really not happy that they didn’t give us a toggle to the old format or at least a way to view ALL content and then switch to folders.
[If you’re in the same boat, please consider checking out Infuse 5. It seems to work seamlessly with Plex Server and keeps it in folder layout. You’ll also be able to add Dropbox, OneDrive and Google Drive. I’ve been recommending Plex & Plex Server for years. I never thought I’d be suggesting folks use a different client, in a Plex app review no less!]Show lessbexn01
Fundamentals don’t work
Plex is excellent at finding information about your videos, showing pretty thumbnails and playing videos in the correct order. But it does not reliably play videos without problems (such as the video stream freezing or going black while audio keeps going). The same machine that serves up plex also does Airvideo and iTunes reliably. I use plex on different devices (some non-Apple) and all of them have these same fundamental problems. My advice would be to try the free version and see if it works. But I think you are asking for trouble subscribing to plex pass (their monthly subscription). Because the dev team is clearly working on new features rather than bedding down critical functionality.Show lessMàlfræðingurinn
UI update makes content harder to find and the app harder for kids
The new UI is much harder to navigate than previous versions. In addition to just taking more effort to go to specific collections and servers, it’s nearly impossible for kids to use. Where previously my 6 year old could easily find her things, now the UI is completely useless to her. As an adult, it’s cumbersome and clunky, and as a kid, it’s broken.
Stay close to your roots here. Make it easy to quickly navigate to specific collections on a specific server. Put some movie icons on collections to make them visually distinctive to require less reading. Make pushed content a browsing experience that one chooses to experience rather than the default. Don’t make this more complicated.Show lessA.Nutron
WHY? PLEX, WHY??? This Update is COUNTER-INTUITIVE
For iOS Plex Media Player App, I haven't check my computer or TV Plex Apps yet::: I truly hate writing update reviews… So let me start by stating, the Plex Media Server and it's organization magniloquence is unmatched for personal media organization and management!
HOWEVER, Plex, why did you remove the "Browse" feature??? I'm sure many geeks like me are super organized when it comes to our media library. I like to go to my playlist section or browse through what libraries I've added to see what I'd like to view or what playlist I have available to watch.
I have at least 3TB of vids, cartoons, anime, movies and tv shows all organized within your brilliant Plex Server... Now!!!, I can't just go to a section I'd like to browse through, as it was before the update. Podcasts are not as important, everybody does podcasts.
Plex is supposed to be for the personal/private media lover who simply wants to watch what is esoteric to them and watch anywhere at anytime without having to go through leaps and bounds to reach his/her favorite playlists... Please RE-ADD the browse feature. It was THE BEST. Now, Plex for iOS is a hassle. Please help, thank you so much!!! Otherwise PLEX is truly awesome!
~ A Loyal PAYING customer!Show lessRegan83
June 2018 update ruined the interface
Plex used to display all of my different content folders on one simple, elegant home screen (I have 10). Now I have to select the Medea type from the bottom bar, then choose which folder from a drop down in the top bar to then look through my preferred folder. Extremely clunky and unintuitive and a massive step backwards. No idea why this was viewed as a positive step by the plex devs. So disappointed. The app is kind of ruined now.Show lessBonavonVovo
Almost perfect
With a large music collection I was looking for something other than iTunes. After a bit of research I decided to try Plex. It took a while to appreciate its powers and features but now 6 months in I am a huge fan. There are a few issues I still have to use iTunes for, like adding To or editing synced playlists but I’m sure these will be addressed in future updates. I love its music management system. If they would just fix the IOS synced playlist issue I’d say this is perfectShow lessAjnabi
Useful features programmed out and constant crashing
I used to love Plex but in the last month or so it has lost a lot of its appeal and usability. The great feature of seeing if a file had been previously played from the colour of the play icon in the folder list has been removed so that now you have to go into the files info to see if it has been “watched” this is relatively minor but still quite annoying.
My bigger problem is that it appears that with the latest update if I try to scroll down in the Folder view when browsing videos, the app crashes meaning that I cannot get to the file I want to watch if it does not come up in one of the “Discover” lists (yes I have updated the server to the latest version)
Very disappointed with this app and how it seems to be getting less user friendly.Show lessAdyna78
