Artwork location resolution

Artists

Fetching images for artists is controlled by the ArtistArtPriority config option. This is a comma-separated list of places to look for artist images. The default is artist.*, album/artist.*, external, meaning:

• First try to find an artist.* image in the artist folder(s)
• If not found, try to find an artist.* image in one of the album folders for this artist
• If not found, try to fetch it from an external service
• If not found, use the artist image placeholder (grey star image)

You can also configure a centralized folder for artist images using the ArtistImageFolder config option and adding image-folder to ArtistArtPriority. When configured, Navidrome will look for image files in that folder named after the artist’s MusicBrainz ID or name.

Albums

CoverArt fetching for albums is controlled by the CoverArtPriority config option. This is a comma-separated list of places to look for album art images. The default is cover.*, folder.*, front.*, embedded, external, meaning:

• First try to find a cover.*, folder.* or front.* image in the album folder(s)
• If not found, try to read an embedded image from one of the mediafiles for that album
• If not found, try to fetch it from an external service (currently only Last.fm)
• If not found, use the cover placeholder (blue record image)

Disc Cover Art

Multi-disc albums can have disc-specific artwork. Navidrome uses the DiscArtPriority config option to find disc-level images. The default is disc*.*, cd*.*, cover.*, folder.*, front.*, discsubtitle, embedded, meaning:

• First try to find a disc*.* or cd*.* image in the disc’s folder
• Then try cover.*, folder.*, or front.* in the disc’s folder
• The special keyword discsubtitle matches image files whose filenames equal the disc’s subtitle
• Try to read an embedded image from one of the mediafiles for that disc
• If no disc-specific image is found, fall back to the album-level artwork

Example directory layout for a multi-disc album:

Music/
└── Artist - Album/
    ├── disc1/
    │   ├── disc1.jpg        ← matched by disc*.*
    │   ├── 01 - Track.flac
    │   └── 02 - Track.flac
    ├── disc2/
    │   ├── cd2.png          ← matched by cd*.*
    │   ├── 01 - Track.flac
    │   └── 02 - Track.flac
    └── cover.jpg            ← album-level fallback

Forcing the Album Artwork for All Discs

If you prefer every disc in a multi-disc album to display the album cover (instead of any disc-specific image or the embedded image of a track), set DiscArtPriority to an empty string:

DiscArtPriority = ""

With no disc-level sources to try, Navidrome skips straight to the album-level artwork fallback, so all discs share the same cover as the album. This is useful when your library has inconsistent or unwanted disc-specific images (e.g. embedded art that differs from the album cover) and you want a uniform look across discs.

MediaFiles

Some players (including Navidrome’s own WebUI) can display different cover art images for each track in an album. Navidrome resolves mediafile artwork in the following order:

1. Try to read an embedded image from the mediafile itself
2. For multi-disc albums, fall back to the disc-level artwork (see Disc Cover Art above)
3. Fall back to the album cover art

MediaFile cover art can be slow in some systems and can be disabled by setting EnableMediaFileCoverArt=false.

Playlists

Playlist artwork is resolved in the following order:

1. Uploaded image: A custom image uploaded via the web UI (see Artwork Uploads below)
2. Sidecar image: An image file with the same base name as the playlist file, placed alongside it
3. M3U directive: An image URL specified via the #EXTALBUMARTURL directive inside the M3U file. To allow HTTP/HTTPS URLs, set EnableM3UExternalAlbumArt to true in your configuration. Local file paths are always accepted.
4. Tiled image: An auto-generated mosaic of up to 4 album covers from the playlist
5. If none of the above are available, the album cover placeholder is used

Example of a playlist with a sidecar image:

Playlists/
├── My Playlist.m3u
└── My Playlist.jpg          ← sidecar image

Artwork Uploads

Navidrome allows uploading custom images for playlists, artists, and internet radio directly from the web UI. This is controlled by the EnableArtworkUpload config option (enabled by default). When disabled, only admin users can upload artwork.

Supported formats: JPEG, PNG, WebP, GIF Maximum file size: 10 MB Storage location: Uploaded images are stored in <DataFolder>/artwork/, organized by entity type (artist/, playlist/, radio/)

Playlist Cover Art

To upload a custom playlist cover, open the playlist in the Navidrome web UI and hover the mouse over the current artwork. You should see a camera icon where you can click to select the image to upload. Uploaded images take priority over all other playlist artwork sources.

Artist Images

Custom artist images can be uploaded via the web UI on the artist detail page. Follow the same process as the playlist cover art.

Internet Radio Images

You can also upload a custom image on the internet radio’s edit page. This image will be used as the station’s artwork instead of fetching its favicon (when available).

Image Format & Quality

Navidrome serves resized artwork as WebP for better compression and performance. The CoverArtQuality config option controls the encoding quality for WebP output (default: 75).

Animated GIFs embedded in or associated with your music files are preserved during resize. They are converted to animated WebP using ffmpeg.