FAQ: Global Bans

Bans allow you to specify music that you never want Roon to recommend or play automatically. You can ban artists, albums, tracks, composers, and compositions, and with Global Bans you can ban content whether it’s in your library or not.

How to ban content?

To ban content, click “Ban this” in the context menu. You can do this from artist, album, composition, or composer pages in both Roon and ARC, or you can also do it from Roon’s selection menu by right-clicking or long-pressing content.

How do bans work?

Banned content is associated with your profile and saved in your Roon Server database. Roon will never automatically play content that’s banned for your profile. This includes library-based play actions like Shuffle All, as well as Roon Radio, Artist Play, and Composer Play.

This also includes times when you simply click play – for example, if you ban a specific track on an album (or if you ban all the skits, for example), the banned track(s) will be skipped when you play the album.

Your bans are also integrated into Valence’s understanding of your tastes – this ensures bans are respected when Roon is recommending content. In addition to Roon Radio, this can also include content that Roon generates for you, like New Releases For You, Daily Mixes, Collaborators, and lists like “Similar Albums” or “Recommended For You”.

When does Roon ignore bans?

You can always click on banned content and play it directly – maybe your feelings have changed!

Bans are also not considered when Roon gives you a comprehensive view of your music – this means banned content will continue to be visible in places like Search Results and Discography, albeit with the ban icon to make your feelings clear!

Lastly, when playing a playlist Roon will play banned tracks, albums, composers, compositions, and artists. If you don’t want to hear that content, remove it from the playlist (or make a copy of the playlist if you didn’t create it yourself.)

How do I unban content?

You can always click “Unban this” to remove a ban. On many screens, you can also click the ban icon to remove the ban.

You can find banned content in your library by using the “Banned (in library) feature in Focus.

To unban content outside your library, search for the specific content you banned and click “Unban this” from the context menu.

Banned aid: other helpful banning tips

If our new banning functionality doesn’t seem to be working correctly, stop and ask whether Roon is in the driver’s seat or if you are. If you’re trying to trip up banning behavior with intentional play actions, you’ll be successful. It’s not built to resist you. When you take control, Roon obeys. It’s made to let you relax when Roon takes over, knowing you won’t hear stinky stuff you REALLY dislike. Sit back and enjoy some music; we’ve got you covered.

There can be a slight delay while bans are fully ingested into your profile.

If you ban something you don’t like, it can take a couple of hours for Roon to spread the news to the far corners of the software. If you ban something and immediately play Roon Radio, you could hear the artist or track you banned before the ingest completes. Sorry, we’re working as fast as we can.

Other banning actions are super speedy! Let’s say there’s a track you always skip in an album you like. ‘Great record, I just don’t like this song’ kinda thing - we all have those. If you go to that album and ban the track you don’t like, then press play, you won’t hear that track. We’ll put it in time-out immediately - no special handling required. How’s that for instant gratification?!