Development – Page 2 – MetaBrainz Blog

Picard 3 beta 3 released

Today, we’re making available another pre-release version for the upcoming MusicBrainz Picard 3. This beta release offers various bugfixes and improvements over the last beta. Most notably the release lookup and matching was improved, several cover art related issues were fixed, the UI got more responsive during file load and the log view became faster and allows better filtering.

Download links and a detailed list of changes since Picard 3 beta 1 are available below. For a more detailed overview of what is new in Picard 3 please see the previous blog post Picard 3 Alpha Release.

While we have all the major features implemented and with the latest bug fixes we are confident in the current code, this is still a pre-release and there might be bugs. If you use this, do so with care, backup your files and please report any issues you encounter.

Some of the changes are also backward incompatible, hence we recommend you make a backup of your Picard.ini config file before trying the beta version. You can do so in Picard’s Options under Advanced > Maintenance.

MusicBrainz database schema change release, 2026-05-11 (with upgrade instructions)

We’re happy to announce the release of our May 2026 database schema change now! Thanks to all who were patient during Monday’s downtime as we released everything to our production servers.

This is a fairly small database schema change release which mostly improves things behind the scenes. Of the schema change tickets, the only one that affects users directly is you are most likely to notice while you browse and edit in MusicBrainz is MBS-14092 (which allows adding series of series, for example for award series for podcasts).

Thanks to chaban, UltimateRiff and yyb987 for having reported bugs and suggested improvements, and thanks to jmrr83, salo.rock and wileyfoxyx for updating the translations.

A new release of MusicBrainz Docker is also available that matches this update of MusicBrainz Server. See the (amended) release notes for update instructions.

MusicBrainz Server update, 2026-04-27

This release mostly consists of a very substantial rewrite of the external links editor code, to make that section of our editors more efficient. While doing that we also fixed a few long-standing links editor bugs. While we kept this code in beta for quite a while so the community could help us catch most new bugs, do not hesitate to report any issues you might find.

A new release of MusicBrainz Docker is also available that matches this update of MusicBrainz Server. See the release notes for update instructions.

Thanks to rinsuki for having contributed to the code. Thanks to fabe56, HibiscusKazeneko and Lioncat6 for having reported bugs and suggested improvements. Thanks to Besnik, DenilsonSama, Khaled Salama, Marc Riera, ShimiDoki, Vaclovas Intas, cerberuzzz, coldified_, dddrnzv, dulijuong_artist, imgradeone, karpuzikov, mfmeulenbelt, salo.rock, smreo1590, syntariavoxmortem, wileyfoxyx and yyb987 for updating the translations. And thanks to all others who tested the beta version!

The git tag is v-2026-04-27.0.

Picard 3 beta 1 released

Today, we’re making available another pre-release version for the upcoming MusicBrainz Picard 3. Beta 1 focuses on fixing issues that were found in the previous releases as well as some minor improvements and updated translations.

Download links and a list of changes since Picard 3 alpha 4 are available below. For a more detailed overview of what is new in Picard 3 please see the previous blog post Picard 3 Alpha Release.

python-discid 1.4.0

A new version of python-discid, a Python wrapper library for libdiscid, is now available. Version 1.4.0 focuses on modernizing the code base and updating the documentation.

The public API is now fully type-hinted and the type hints are also used in the documentation. A Disc.pregap property was added for convenient access to the first track’s pregap. For the full list of changes see the changelog in the documentation.

The new version is available on PyPI. See also the install instructions for more options. Please note that the new minimal Python version supported is now Python 3.10.

Picard 3 alpha 4 released

Today, we’re making available another pre-release version for the upcoming MusicBrainz Picard 3. Alpha 4 focuses on fixing issues that were found in the previous releases as well as some minor improvements and updated translations.

Download links and a list of changes since Picard 3 alpha 3 are available below. For a more detailed overview of what is new in Picard 3 please see the previous blog post Picard 3 Alpha Release.

Some of the changes are also backward incompatible, hence we recommend you make a backup of your Picard.ini config file before trying the alpha version. You can do so in Picard’s Options under Advanced > Maintenance.

Schema change release: May 11, 2026

MusicBrainz is announcing a new schema change release set for May 11, 2026. Schema-wise, this release will be very light. At the same time, we’ll be requiring some major dependency upgrades to Perl, PostgreSQL, and Node.js. We’ll also be switching from Redis to Valkey in production. See below for more information.

The only breaking schema change is MBS-14252. It drops columns which are unused even in MusicBrainz Server, so should have little impact.

Here is the complete list of scheduled tickets:

Database schema

The following tickets change the database schema in some way.

MBS-6551: Database does not prevent a release from having duplicate label/catno pairs. This ticket involves replacing an index on the release_label table for additional data sanity. We’ll introduce a unique index on (release, label, catalog_number) (with NULL values treated as equal). This should have no impact on downstream users.
MBS-14092: Add support for series of series. This will allow connecting series that are related to each other in some way; for example, a series of series that have been honored with the same award, like the Golden Globe Award for Best Podcast. This involves adding a new series_series view, and replacing the allowed_series_entity_type constraint on the series_type table. It doesn’t modify or remove any other parts of the schema.
MBS-14252: Drop “source” column from iswc and isrc tables. As the title says, this drops the unused isrc.source and iswc.source columns from the database. Unless you’ve specifically referenced these columns in a query, this change should have no impact on you.

Server dependencies

MBS-14243: Upgrade the required version of Perl to 5.42. This is required as Perl 5.38 will no longer receive critical security fixes past July 2026.
MBS-14246: Upgrade the required version of PostgreSQL to 18. We last upgraded to PostgreSQL v16 two years ago, and would like to take advantage of the many performance advancements in PostgreSQL since then.

Note that the PGDG maintains an official APT repository for Debian and Ubuntu. PostgreSQL 18.3 is also available on Amazon RDS.

An upgrade script will be available for MusicBrainz Docker users with instructions provided at release time.
MBS-14244: Upgrade the required version of Node.js to 24. This is a straightforward upgrade to the latest LTS release, as Node.js v20 will soon be end-of-life.
MBS-14245: Switch from Redis to Valkey. Valkey is compatible with Redis OSS 7.2, and should be a drop-in replacement. There’s no reason to expect that Redis would stop working either. (The commands that MusicBrainz Server uses are very basic, and work even in Redis v3.)

Search server

SEARCH-756: Trigger reindex from dbmirror2 replication data. This drops the dependency on RabbitMQ and pg_amqp for live updating the Solr search indexes, and triggers the reindex process directly from PostgreSQL instead, by relying on the change data we already generate there for replication packets. If you run a local search indexer, this will simplify the setup/dependencies needed. Database-wise, it will require replacing triggers and creating a new “sir” schema.

We’ll post upgrade instructions for standalone/mirror servers on the day of the release. If you have any questions, feel free to comment below or on the relevant above-linked tickets.

Picard 3 alpha 3 released

While our hearts are heavy following Rob’s passing, we remain committed to our mission and carry on, as Rob would have expected from us.

Today, we’re making available another pre-release version for the upcoming MusicBrainz Picard 3. Alpha 3 focuses on fixing issues that were found in the previous releases as well as some minor improvements and updated translations.

Download links and a list of changes since Picard 3 alpha 2 are available below. For a more detailed overview of what is new in Picard 3 please see the previous blog post Picard 3 Alpha Release.

As before this is still an early pre-release. While we have all the major features implemented and we are rather confident in the current code, it is still a development release and it is expected there will be bugs. If you use this, do so with care, backup your files and please report any issues you encounter.

Thanks a lot to everyone who gave feedback, reported issues and provided translations.

MusicBrainz Server update, 2026-02-12

We have a small release coming mid-week for once since we wanted to deploy some behind-the-scenes updates to remove potential vulnerabilities. Other than that, this release includes a few small URL and interface improvements, and converts a few more pages to use React.

A new release of MusicBrainz Docker is also available that matches this update of MusicBrainz Server. See the release notes for update instructions.

Thanks to SuperSaltyGamer for having contributed to the code. Thanks to chaban, Griomo, iamdrowning, Raman Sinclair, salo.rock and SuperSaltyGamer for having reported bugs and suggested improvements. Thanks to BestSteve, EmO686, Lise Andersen, djtusa, karpuzikov, m67186636, mfmeulenbelt, wileyfoxyx and yyb987 for updating the translations. And thanks to all others who tested the beta version!

The git tag is v-2026-02-12.0.

Picard 3 alpha 2 released

A second alpha version for the upcoming MusicBrainz Picard 3 is now available. This focuses on fixing issues that were found in the previous alpha 1 as well as some minor improvements and updated translations.

Download links and a list of changes since Picard 3 alpha 1 are available below. For a more detailed overview of what is new in Picard 3 please see the previous blog post Picard 3 Alpha Release.

Thanks a lot to everyone who gave feedback, reported issues and provided translations.