Knowledge Base

Introduction

Plex, the Plex Play logo and Plex Media Server are trademarks of Plex and used under a license.

For EVERY client out of the box, Plex sets the video quality at 720p.
Which is good because it will work on the vast majority of existing devices across the board without issue.
However taking  1080p video and shrinking or transcoding down to 720p effects picture quality and also is tough on the Plex Server that is serving the media.
Hence this site was created to educate users on the Optimal settings for Plex.

While the below settings are being called "Optimal", it needs to be understood what "Optimal" means.
These settings will help get every pixel from the server to you TV or screen that is meant to be seen.
You will also see quicker start times and better scrubbing (Fast FWD/RWD).
With that being said, if your server or your own connection isn't substantial enough to receive all the pixels you may encounter some buffering from time to time.

In that case it's best to step your Video quality down to the next Quality profile down.