While I agree that this would be great, if you do a Forum Search you'll see that it has been requested many times - and many times it has been dismissed as being an unnecessary "Feature".

The title of this sub-forum should really be changed from "Serato Software Feature Suggestions" to "Serato Software Suggestions".

That's a shame, as one of the biggest problems djs face is playing the same tracks most of the time.. music they know and are comfortable with.

Even though i already try to vary my sets as much as possible, i know this would help a great deal!

Correct!! Those that only mix to death the same few dozen songs, over and over again, have no idea why an instant Track Preview can be a real help.

I had used Mixvibes Cross DJ and Mixxx before coming to Serato. Both have a Track Preview without having to load it in a deck or a Sampler. After I installed Serato DJ, I thought my right mouse button broke - it did nothing (and it still does nothing!)!! I thought that was strange, but after checking the documentation found that, as you did, there is no dedicated Track Preview function.

Like you, I also mentioned it here, in the so-called "Feature Suggestions" forum, and quickly found out that any "Feature" that is not like old-school two turntable DJ'ing is not welcome - many here haven't yet fully recovered from the shock of adding "Sync"!! I'm not even going to get into the "SSL Groupies" problem.

Frankly, it seems like the only hope for having this implemented would be financial pressure from competing DJ software. Truly unfortunate.

Good Luck!

Instant track preview would be a massive feature as with expanding larger Album artwork previews.
it seems inefficient to have to load track after track just to hear quick previews.

+1

+1

i don´t know if its impossible in serato i have an nv
so i cant´t change the mapping .-(
in traktor i have map the track scroll button in this way preview the tracks by scrolling
and push scroll knob =load, analyz, the track ,set cue, set beatgrid ,play at first cue, sync wth the other deck, set 4er loop
i miss the fucking endless way,s to customize your gear with the modifiers

Track preview is a must for next Serato update!

I switched from Mixvibes to Serato a month ago and I was very disappointed
that Serato didn't have the track preview feature.

The preview feature really helps you to figure what the song sounds like,
when you haven't heard it in a while and you are busy while DJing in the club.

I'm currently using DDJ SX2 and I would prefer that the big knob up in the middle would have the function when pressed once and kept on just like in Mixvibes. Switching folders function could be Shift + Press the knob. If that's not possible at least add the feature on the computer keyboard somehow.


Dear Serato staff, whoever might read this. This is very important and should be included
in the next upgrade, please.

+1

i don't get it. what's wrong with just loading the track and listen to it?
you don't have to wait for the big waveform to skim through

Am not sure if you’ve used an instant track preview ..I’m guessing not.

Have a read of the posts above and your question should be answered.👍🏻

i'm well aware of that feature and i've never seen much sense in it.

IMHO, Serato will never include this. Here's my own personal fix -
serato.com

My friend, in Mixvibes you simply press track preview on the highlighted track and it'll start playing from a random part of the song usually from the beginning or pre-hook.
Having to load a song to a deck is time-consuming as hell.

Thanks Hanginon for your answer.
If Tesla can have an autopilot feature, I'm sure that Serato can also add this very small but essential feature to its software.

No preview button is a deal breaker for me. The OP's suggestion on using the rotary knob for preview and search a track is spot on. Couldnt be simpler.

For all those people who don't understand this please describe your workflow for pre-listening to tracks? I honestly can't find a workflow that isn't nuts, and I've had to disable Serato functionality to try to get round this.

Best I can find is leave a turntable playing on DVS then load tracks into a deck. But there are so many issues with this I find it hard to understand why people don't think a preview deck is necessary:

* What if you've two tunes playing? My Seventy Two can't cue the sample channel, and only has two deck channels, so if I've two tunes playing I can't listen to any other tracks. (Yes OK I could drag a track into a sample slot as an instant double, do my pre-listening, then drag back into a deck to mix out, but that's hardly streamlined and I can't nudge, I've probably caused a glitch, I've lost EQ and control over that track, etc.)

* How does anyone sample tunes if you don't have turntables? Do you set a cue marker in the middle of every track, then load and hit the cue? I guess you always make it cue 4 or something so you can load, jump past intro and preview tracks quickly? Or bash at the beatjump button? I've had to disable lots of handy Serato functionality (eg, load to first cue, play from start - so automix doesn't work either), so the turntable trick works.

* I'm constantly having to adjust the needle on the turntable while previewing, as some tracks are short and some are long, so the middle of a long mix in techno track might be after the end of a hip hop track. This is extra painful when the laptop is on the opposite side of the empty deck, so I'm running from side to side behind the decks to select next track, adjust needle, select next track, etc!

* It is more likely I'll drop a track on to the live deck. But...I can't "disable needle search during playback" because then I can't preview tracks at all!

How do people do this?

I would even sacrifice my sampler if I could use it as a pre-listen deck. I have a large library, I don't know every track on every album, I like to go off piste, and I follow the crowd, so arguments like "you should know your tunes" aren't going to be helpful.

I adore my Seventy Two and switched to Serato for that reason, and I love the feel of DVS on Serato, but this lack of preview is really killing me! On Traktor I had an encoder mapped to load into the preview player and jump to half way through the track in one click. I'd happily consider any solution (short of ctrl/cmd+O to open in another media player, which is the best answer I've found elsewhere, as I worry it'd play to master out one day and I'd be unaware inside my cans).

That said, if there is an external macOS player that could load, jump to half way, and never ever play on the active output, I'd consider it.

I suspect that many mixers' routing is the problem. If the mixers themselves generate the headphone signal, and Serato only sends the mixers those three streams for decks 1, 2 and sample, perhaps Serato architecturally can't possibly get a preview channel to the headphones? Is that the real reason this has always been a non-starter with Serato?

I'm thinking another approach might be having something like bome midi translator keep track of which deck is live visa the up fader signals, then a specially mapped button always loads to the zero level deck, skips forwards say 96 beats or to cue 8 (would take adding this to every track), then plays, and map that over the usual load midi.

Via, not visa!

It could also switch the cue deck if necessary, switch to browser view for 30 seconds, and switch to the cue or auto loop pages, etc.

On my Seventy Two I can't access the monitor directly, but on my MC6000Mk2 I can, so I'm half right above.

Hi Everyone, I'm new to this forum, but I's still shocked that an actual "previewing feature does not exist on serato...

I've seen some very good points on this post but they seem to have been forgotten or dismissed so here's my perspective:

I've just barely explored Rekordbox and the very first thing that BLEW my mind was the fact that you could just listen to the tracks (once analyzed) by clicking on the waveform right next to it's "information/title/etc.". Not only does it not need to be loaded on a deck, you can also just jump and listen to the specific selected regions of track (say the drop) in a matter of milliseconds!

Right now, just to see if a track could fit for the next mix, you have to load it onto a deck, wait for it to pop up on the screen of your mixer (that can take seconds depending on computer & hardware) and THEN you can either scratch through the track or go back to the computer and click on the selected region of the track to see if it fits... Displaying the track's waveform in the informations tab can also give an idea to DJ's visually of what the track's structure looks like.

Replacing this tedious process to a single click on the featured waveform next to the track just like Rekordbox has done is a next generation speed for track selecting. Adding this feature will also help serato compete against their rival softwares as this feature is already making me think twice about my next purchase. Hope the Serato team gives it a good reflection since this feature is actually too important to be dismissed.

+1 for me too!

Like I've written in another topic regarding a pre-listening feature next to the tracks. Once you've used this option, you will understand how powerfull audio speed search in a list of tracks can be.

In Rekordbox you can add a colomn in your tracklist, showing a tiny waveform of the complete track. Where ever you put your mouse pointer on that tiny waveform, you'll here the sound on that spot instantly. From track to track, in real time speed.
Audio routing for pre-listening can be done to a preferred fader and it's headphone CUE.

In this case you can play a track on deck 1/fader 2, load a next track on deck 2/fader 3, and do a audio speed search in your list of tracks, by listening via the CUE of fader 1 or 4.


Looking at Pioneer DJ's (accidental) future discharge of long time paid Rekordbox customers, due to their monthly subsrciption based Rekordbox 6.0, Serato could create a warm "welcome to us" with this pre-listen feature...

Another advantage of Previewing/Prelistening directly from the Library is, regardless of the position of the crossfader or volume faders, a Track will never get accidentally marked "Played".

I always thought this would be a great replacement use for the Needle Search hardware on my sx2. I never use that strip to scrub through a track on a deck, but if I could flip a software switch that tells sdj to scrub the highlighted track using needle Search that would be bomb

You are wasting energy at the keyboard - Serato only cares about adding additional NEW hardware support. V2.5.7 on Windows is now a whopping 752.86MB (!!!!) download.

I switched from rekordbox to serato and really miss this feature. Please add her!

Agreed, especially if you are using a two deck controller.

This has been requested frequently - unfortunately, IMHO, this is never going to happen.

+1

+2 I want to go back to Rekordbox now miss the feature

You can go back to ANY DJ software - they ALL (except for Serato) have it!

i think i can make this work, post it here and i will try: serato.com

and no, that's no spam :D

Double posting is already spam in a way, but hey, we will see if you can actually deliver something or just talk warm words.

And the lack of Library Track preview in a "flagship" DJ software suite is 100% embarrassing by the way, Serato team.

Even worse that the track preview area sucks as well. It takes too much space (should be placed on the right side like in VDJ) and tracks get INSTANTLY removed when checking a song in the deck again, rather than waiting 15sec.

Lazy developers.

UP!!!
Please add track preview in library window (like Rekordbox) ....

I would like to add that the functionality exists on Serato Studio