MP3tag does not respond when loading 1000 files

Support
1

Bug Report + Feature Request

Product / Version: Mp3tag (please specify the exact version and OS)

Bug Report

Description of the issue:
When loading multiple music files at once, Mp3tag freezes and becomes unresponsive. As a result, the session is lost and I have to start the tagging work from scratch.

Steps to reproduce:

  1. Launch Mp3tag.

  2. Select and load a large number of audio files (e.g., several hundred at once).

  3. Wait until the program starts processing.

  4. The application freezes and does not recover.

Expected behavior:
Mp3tag should remain stable and allow processing of multiple files without freezing.

Actual behavior:
The program hangs and becomes unresponsive during bulk file loading, forcing me to restart the program and redo the work.

Environment details:

  • Operating system: (e.g. Windows 11 64-bit)

  • Mp3tag version: (e.g. v3.23a)

  • Number of files attempted to load: (e.g. ~500–1000)

Feature Request

To improve the user experience and minimize the impact of crashes, I’d like to suggest the following improvements:

  1. Session Autosave

    • Automatically save the current state of loaded files, edits, and configurations at regular intervals (e.g., every few minutes).

    • On restart after a crash, Mp3tag should offer to restore the last session.

  2. Incremental / Batched File Loading

    • Instead of loading all files into memory at once, Mp3tag could load them in smaller batches (e.g., 200–500 files).

    • While working, additional batches could be processed in the background or on demand.

    • This would improve stability and memory usage with large libraries.

  3. Crash Recovery Option

    • If the program detects an unexpected shutdown, provide an option to resume from the last stable state instead of starting over.

Benefits:

  • Prevents data loss and wasted time after crashes.

  • Improves stability when working with very large libraries.

  • Increases reliability and usability for power users.

2

What format of music files? FLAC? mp3? Which other?
Where are the music files stored? On a internal local SSD or HDD?
On a external USB drive?
On a network attached storage (NAS)?

3

I have no problems to load 20,000 files in one go.
Do you open the location via the file menu?
Via the explorer context menu?
Do you drag&drop the files?

Does this happen to all groups of files or just a special set with always the same files?

BTW: current version is 3.31d - so an update from

and a retest is strongly advised.

it would be much better to keep 1 topic and section clean and dedicated to only 1 purpose. There is a special forum section for feature requests.

In respect to the contents of the requests: I think we have to get to the root cause of the initial problem as then it could be that several of the requests are not necessary any more.

4

Maybe a very drastic option but can you rename your mp3tag.cfg to mp3tag.old (located in your userprofile) and try again, this would give mp3tag a clean slate configuration wise. Don't delete that file, just rename it. mp3tag.cfg it is called

Edit: if you installed mp3tag normally it would be located in
C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\Mp3tag

if you installed the portable version, it will be where the program is itself.

5

Several members of the forum have asked you for details. Those are required to diagnose this problem. But a week has passed and you have not responded to their requests or to their suggestions. Why is that? Did you manage to fix the problem yourself? If so, please share your solution here.