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Where Traktor Stores Your Library: collection.nml, Stripes and Backups

Updated · by the MixGoat team

Short answer

Traktor Pro 4 stores its library in one folder: ~/Documents/Native Instruments/Traktor 4.x.x/ on macOS and C:\Users\<you>\Documents\Native Instruments\Traktor 4.x.x\ on Windows (Traktor 3.x.x for Pro 3). collection.nml in that folder is the whole library: every track with its path, BPM, key as a MUSICAL_KEY value, cues, loops and grid markers as CUE_V2 entries, plus the playlist tree as NODE elements. Traktor Settings.tsi holds preferences and controller mappings. Stripes and Transients are waveform and analysis caches Traktor rebuilds on demand, Backup holds the dated copies Traktor writes on every save, and History holds one playlist per session. Back up collection.nml and Traktor Settings.tsi; everything else can be regenerated.

Step by step

  1. 1

    Open the Traktor folder

    Quit Traktor and open ~/Documents/Native Instruments/ (Finder → Go → Home → Documents) or Documents\Native Instruments\ in Explorer. Each installed version has its own folder named after it, Traktor 4.2.0 for example; an upgrade from Pro 3 leaves the old Traktor 3.x.x folder in place and copies the collection into the new one. Preferences → File Management → Root Dir shows which folder the running Traktor is using.

  2. 2

    collection.nml: the library itself

    collection.nml is UTF-8 XML. Under COLLECTION, each ENTRY has a LOCATION (DIR with /: separators, FILE and VOLUME), INFO (bitrate, genre, comment, rating, play count), TEMPO (BPM), MUSICAL_KEY (VALUE 0 to 23, which Traktor renders as musical or Open Key notation according to your key preference) and one CUE_V2 per cue, loop, grid, fade or load marker with TYPE, START, LEN and HOTCUE attributes. Under PLAYLISTS, NODE elements of TYPE FOLDER and PLAYLIST form the tree, each playlist listing its tracks by the same path key.

  3. 3

    Traktor Settings.tsi: preferences and mappings

    Traktor Settings.tsi in the same folder stores every Preferences pane, deck layouts, audio device setup and controller mappings. It is what you export with Preferences → Export and import on a new machine. It does not contain any track data.

  4. 4

    Stripes, Transients and Coverart: caches

    Stripes holds the small overview waveforms shown in the browser and deck, Transients holds analysis data used by the beatgrid and Pro 4's flexible grid, Coverart holds resized artwork. All three are regenerated when you load or re-analyse a track, so they are safe to delete if the folder grows large or a waveform looks stale, and they are not worth backing up.

  5. 5

    Backup: Traktor's own dated copies

    Traktor writes a dated copy of collection.nml into Backup/Collection (and of the settings into Backup/Settings) whenever it saves the collection. If Traktor fails to start after a crash, quit, rename the current collection.nml, copy the newest file from Backup/Collection to collection.nml and relaunch. Those copies live on the same disk, so they do not replace an external backup.

  6. 6

    History, Playlists and the rest

    History stores one .nml per DJ session, which is what the History node in the browser reads and where Traktor's tracklists come from. Playlists is where exported playlist .nml files land by default. Recordings holds mix recordings, and Pro 4 also keeps Remix Sets and Loops folders for samples. None of these are needed for Traktor to open your collection.

What MixGoat reads and writes in this folder

MixGoat only ever touches collection.nml. To find it, it lists ~/Documents/Native Instruments/ (or the Windows Documents equivalent), sorts the Traktor* folders by name and takes the newest that contains a collection.nml, so Traktor 4.x.x is chosen over an older Traktor 3.x.x. You can override this with "Change location" in MixGoat, and an override that points nowhere reports not found rather than silently falling back.

Reading (migration to another app, cue review, Cloud Backup) is read-only and Traktor can be open. Writing (saving detected cues and loops, migrating into Traktor, sending a playlist) first copies collection.nml to collection.nml.bak and then updates entries in place, replacing only Cue and Loop entries and leaving grid, fade and load markers as they are. Because Traktor rewrites collection.nml when it quits, MixGoat refuses to write while Traktor is running. Cloud Backup uploads collection.nml gzipped whenever it changes, waiting five quiet minutes and skipping while Traktor is open.

What is not in the Traktor folder

Your music. collection.nml stores paths, not audio, so the Traktor folder is small and the music can be anywhere, including external drives (stored with the VOLUME name). Nothing performance-related is written into the audio files either: Traktor does not tag cues into MP3s the way Serato does, which is why a track copied to another computer arrives with no cues unless collection.nml comes with it, and why MixGoat's Traktor cue writes go to collection.nml rather than the files.

Traktor Pro 4's stems are computed on the fly and cached, not stored as separate files you need to keep. Expansions and Kontrol firmware live under Native Access, not here.

Traktor Pro 3 and older versions

Traktor Pro 3 uses the identical layout under Traktor 3.x.x, and Pro 2 under Traktor 2.x.x. The collection.nml format is stable enough that a Pro 3 collection opens in Pro 4 (Traktor imports it on first launch of the new version) and that MixGoat, Lexicon, DJ Conversion Utility and rekordcloud all read it directly. Going backwards, from Pro 4 to Pro 3, works for tracks and cues but drops Pro 4-only data such as the flexible beatgrid.

Back up collection.nml automatically

MixGoat Cloud Backup watches the Traktor folder and uploads collection.nml when it changes. Part of the GOAT plan.

Back up collection.nml automatically

Frequently asked questions

Where is collection.nml on Windows?
C:\Users\<your name>\Documents\Native Instruments\Traktor 4.x.x\collection.nml. Preferences → File Management → Root Dir shows the exact folder for your version.
Can I delete the Stripes and Transients folders?
Yes, with Traktor closed. They are caches for the overview waveforms and analysis data and Traktor rebuilds them as tracks are loaded. Cues, grids and playlists are unaffected because they live in collection.nml.
Where are my playlists stored in Traktor?
Inside collection.nml, under the PLAYLISTS element, as nested NODE entries. The Playlists folder on disk only holds .nml files you exported yourself.
Does Traktor store cue points in the music files?
No. Every cue, loop, grid marker and fade marker is a CUE_V2 entry in collection.nml. The audio files are never modified by Traktor.
Which files do I need to back up?
collection.nml and Traktor Settings.tsi. The Backup folder is a bonus, not a substitute, because it is on the same disk. The full procedure is in the Traktor backup guide.
What does the MUSICAL_KEY value mean?
Traktor stores the detected key as a number from 0 to 23 in MUSICAL_KEY VALUE and shows it as a musical key or Open Key in the browser. Converters such as MixGoat map that number to Camelot or standard notation when migrating.