Sorting of TV special episodes

[ThomasPdt 4]

Hi,

I'm having issues with the way Emby handles ordering and playing of special episodes.

I've tried lots of possible configurations and I'm unhappy with all of them.

My specials are stored in each season folder.

What I would like is for Emby to:

- show a season's specials at the end of the episode list of that season;
- go through normal season episodes without being interrupted by a special (for example, when finishing season 1, I want Emby to start playing episode 1 of next season, not a special);

I know it's possible to change `Airs before episode` to tell Emby to show a special at the end of a season after all normal episodes, but this doesn't answer my requirement as Emby will play all specials before going to the next season.

Basically, all I want is to have the specials in the list of episodes of the season but I don't want Emby to play them automatically, is there anyone who can tell me how to do this ?

N.B. Please note that the Emby's documentation on specials ordering is outdated as it refers to fields that don't exist anymore, it would be nice if admins could update it.
https://emby.media/support/articles/Ordering-TV-Specials.html

Thanks in advance

[GrimReaper 4898]

2 hours ago, ThomasPdt said:

Basically, all I want is to have the specials in the list of episodes of the season but I don't want Emby to play them automatically, is there anyone who can tell me how to do this ?

There ain't, as that is not feasible. If the episode shows in the list - it'll be played, regardless if its a regular episode or a Special, it can't be skipped automatically. 

2 hours ago, ThomasPdt said:

My specials are stored in each season folder

Why don't you store those in Season 0 and just add those specials that you do want to be played within particular season via their metadata? 

Edited Tuesday at 09:58 PM by GrimReaper

[Luke 42245]

Maybe what we need in the database is the flag to indicate if it's critical to the story or not. Then if it's not, it won't be included when playing the whole season.

[ThomasPdt 4]

On 3/31/2026 at 11:57 PM, GrimReaper said:

There ain't, as that is not feasible. If the episode shows in the list - it'll be played, regardless if its a regular episode or a Special, it can't be skipped automatically. 

Why don't you store those in Season 0 and just add those specials that you do want to be played within particular season via their metadata? 

Because I don't want any of them to play automatically and if I put everything in the season 0 folder, all specials will be mixed up in a Specials season view in the Emby app.
If you have tens of specials for a show, it becomes cumbersome to scroll through the whole list of specials to find the specials related to the season you just watched.
It's much more intuitive to have them in the season itself (for example, Deleted Scenes of S01E01 in S01 view after all normal episodes of season 1.