Basic Tags

The following tags are supported and are written in the standard format that can be read by other software. The information is populated from MusicBrainz data for most releases, without any special Picard settings. Note that some of the information such as ‘lyrics’ is not contained within the MusicBrainz database, and will not be provided automatically.

All of these are also available as variables for use in Picard Scripts (for tagging, for file renaming and in several other more minor settings) by wrapping them between percent ‘%’ symbols (e.g. %title%).

Most tags beginning with musicbrainz_ provide the MusicBrainz Identifier (MBID) of the entity. The MBID is a 32-character identifier assigned to an entity (e.g.: artist, album, track or work) to uniquely identify the entity. For more information about MBIDs, please see the MusicBrainz Identifier page in the MusicBrainz documentation.

Note

Tags will not be created and will not be available as variables if there was no value retrieved for the tag from the MusicBrainz database.

Note

Some of these tags are only supported for certain file types or tag formats. Please see the Picard Tag Mapping section for details.

acoustid_fingerprint

AcoustID Fingerprint for the track. The fingerprint is based on the audio information found in a file, and is calculated using the Chromaprint software.

acoustid_id

AcoustID associated with the track. The AcoustID is the identifier assigned to an audio file based on its ‘acoustid_fingerprint’. Multiple fingerprints may be assigned the same AcoustID if the fingerprints are similar enough.

album

Title of the release.

albumartist

Artist(s) primarily credited on the release.

albumartistsort

Release Artist’s Sort Name (e.g.: “Beatles, The”).

albumsort

Release Title’s Sort Name.

artist

Track Artist Name(s). (string)

artists

Track Artist Name(s). (multi-value) (since Picard 1.3)

artistsort

Track Artist Sort Name.

asin

Amazon Standard Identification Number - the number identifying the item on Amazon.

barcode

Release Barcode - the barcode assigned to the release.

bpm

Beats per minute of the track. Only available to the file naming script.

catalognumber

The number(s) assigned to the release by the label(s), which can often be found on the spine or near the barcode. There may be more than one, especially when multiple labels are involved.

comment

Disambiguation Comment - the comment entered to help distinguish one release from another (e.g.: Deluxe version with 2 bonus tracks).

compilation

(since Picard 1.3, compatible with iTunes) 1 for Various Artist albums, otherwise 0.
(Picard 1.2 or previous) 1 if multiple track artists (including featured artists), otherwise 0.

copyright

Contains the copyright message for the copyright holder of the original sound, beginning with a year and a space character.

date

Release Date (YYYY-MM-DD) - the date that the release (album) was issued.

discnumber

Number of the disc in this release that contains this track.

discsubtitle

The Media Title given to a specific disc.

encodedby

Encoded by (person or organization). Only available to the file naming script.

encodersettings

Encoder Settings used. Only available to the file naming script.

isrc

International Standard Recording Code - an international standard code for uniquely identifying sound recordings and music video recordings. See Wikipedia for more information. (since Picard 0.12)

key

Key of the music.

label

Release Label Name(s).

language

Work lyric language as per ISO 639-3 if track relationships are enabled in Options and a related work exists. (since Picard 0.10)

lyrics

Lyrics for the track. Not provided by MusicBrainz.

media

Release Format (e.g.: CD). See the Release Format page on the MusicBrainz website for more information.

musicbrainz_albumartistid

Release Artist’s MusicBrainz Identifier (MBID).

musicbrainz_albumid

Release MusicBrainz Identifier (MBID).

musicbrainz_artistid

Track Artist’s MusicBrainz Identifier (MBID).

musicbrainz_discid

Disc ID is the code number which MusicBrainz uses to link a physical CD to a release listing. This is based on the table of contents (TOC) information read from the disc. This tag contains the Disc ID if the album information was retrieved using “Tools ‣ Lookup CD”. (since Picard 0.12)

musicbrainz_originalalbumid

Original Release’s MusicBrainz Identifier (MBID).

musicbrainz_originalartistid

Original Track Artist’s MusicBrainz Identifier (MBID).

musicbrainz_recordingid

Recording’s MusicBrainz Identifier (MBID).

musicbrainz_releasegroupid

Release Group’s MusicBrainz Identifier (MBID).

musicbrainz_trackid

Release Track MusicBrainz Identifier (MBID).

musicbrainz_workid

MusicBrainz Identifier for the work (MBID).

originalalbum

Release Title of the earliest release in the Release Group intended for the title of the original recording.

originalartist

Track Artist of the earliest release in the Release Group intended for the performer(s) of the original recording.

originaldate

The original release date in the format YYYY-MM-DD. By default this is set to the earliest release in the Release Group. This can provide, for example, the release date of the vinyl version of what you have on CD. (Included as standard from Picard 0.15, and using the Original Release Date plugin if you are still using a non-NGS version earlier than Picard 0.15)

Note

This is the same information provided in the _releasegroup_firstreleasedate variable, and is consistent across all tracks in the release. If you prefer to have this tag populated with the date of the earliest recording of the track in the database, which will likely be different for each track in the release, this can be achieved by enabling a one-line tagging script as $set(originaldate,%_recording_firstreleasedate%). Be aware that setting this can cause a release to be scattered across multiple directories if you use %originaldate% as part of the path portion of your file naming script.

Note

If you are storing tags in MP3 files as ID3v2.3 then the original date can only be stored as a year.

originalyear

The year of the original release date in the format YYYY. By default this is set to the earliest release in the Release Group. This can provide, for example, the release year of the vinyl version of what you have on CD.

releasecountry

Country in which the release was issued.

releasestatus

Release Status indicating the “official” status of the release. Possible values include official, promotional, bootleg, and pseudo-release.

releasetype

Release Group Type (see also _primaryreleasetype and _secondaryreleasetype)

script

The script used to write the release’s track list. The possible values are taken from the ISO 15924 standard. (since Picard 0.10)

subtitle

Used for information directly related to the contents title.

title

Track Title.

titlesort

Track Title’s Sort Name.

totaldiscs

Total number of discs in this release

totaltracks

Total tracks on this disc.

tracknumber

Track number on the disc.

website

Used for official artist website.