How to · Serato DJ

Color-code your tracks in Serato DJ.

Serato lets you assign colors to individual tracks in your library. Vibes takes it further by building a vibe-based color system in prep and exporting it as named crates that land ready to use in Serato.

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Vibes library showing color-coded vibe categories

Build your color system once in Vibes, export named crates straight into Serato.

Color-code your tracks in Serato DJ, step by step.

Serato DJ lets you assign a colour label to any track directly in the library view. Here is how to do it using the built-in native workflow in Serato DJ Pro 3.x.

Open your library in Serato DJ Pro

Launch Serato DJ Pro and make sure your library is loaded and visible in the main library panel. You do not need to be in a live session to manage track colours. The library view is available any time the software is open.

Make sure the Colour column is visible, then click it to assign a colour

In Serato DJ Pro 3.x, the colour column appears as a small grey dot or coloured dot near the left side of each track row. If you do not see it, right-click any column header in the library to open the column picker and enable the Colour field. Once visible, click the dot on the track you want to colour. A colour palette pops up - select the colour you want. The track dot updates immediately and the virtual-deck spinning circle will also reflect that colour when the track is loaded to a deck. There is no colour option in the right-click track context menu; you must click the colour column dot directly.

Assign colours consistently across your library

Work through your library applying colours that match your system, for example red for peak-time tracks or green for openers. To save time, multi-select tracks using Shift+click or Ctrl+click (Cmd+click on Mac), then click the colour dot on any highlighted track - the chosen colour is applied to the entire selection at once. Serato saves the colour against the track in its library database.

Use coloured crates to group by feel

Create crates in Serato and name them to match your colour categories, for example 'Peak Time' or 'Deep Opener'. Drag colour-tagged tracks into the matching crate. This gives you a second layer of organisation: a colour on the track itself plus a named crate you can browse quickly during a set. In Serato DJ Pro 4.0 you can also assign colours directly to crates via right-click on the crate, but that is a 4.0-only feature not available in 3.x.

The catch

Serato saves colours per track and multi-select (Shift+click or Ctrl+click) lets you apply a colour to a batch of tracks at once, which speeds up the process significantly. There is still no automated rule-based colouring or global bulk-replace, so building a consistent system across a large library still requires manual selection and tagging in batches. If you do not see the colour column, enable it by right-clicking any library column header and ticking Colour.

3 selected

The faster way

Build your color system once. Export it to Serato automatically.

Vibes lets you define Categories and Vibes (your own tags for energy, mood, and role) during prep, then exports each vibe as a named crate directly into Serato. Your color-coded system is ready before you even open Serato.

See how it works

Tag tracks by feel using Vibe Sort, one keypress per track, during library prep not during a session

Combinations auto-detects tracks that share multiple vibes and creates ready-made crates, such as tracks tagged both House and Peak Time

Export writes .crate files straight into Serato, so named groupings appear in your crate list with no manual dragging

Auto-Tag uses on-device AI trained on your own tagging to suggest vibes for new tracks, keeping your system consistent without extra effort

Organize in Vibes, export to Serato DJ.

Your playlists, tags, ratings, and cue points travel back to the gear you play on, so nothing you do in Vibes is locked away.

Track 001

Artist A

128

Afterhours

Mysterious

Introspective

Track 002

Artist B

124

Cozy Floor

Peaceful

Home

Track 003

Artist C

132

Rave

Aggressive

Festival

Build & Release

Playlists

Vibes

Mood

Aggressive

Euphoric

Melancholic

Mysterious

Peaceful

Playful

Tense

Function

Arrangement

Sets

Club Night 12/28

NYE Closing Set

Rooftop 01/04

Frequently asked questions

The honest answers, including the trade-offs.

No. Vibes is a prep and library app, not a live performance tool. It does not assign Serato's native per-track color labels. What it does instead is export named crates into Serato that represent your vibe categories, giving you an organized, consistent grouping system without manual track-by-track work inside Serato.

Yes. Vibes exports .crate files directly into the Serato library folder on your machine. When you open Serato, those crates appear in your crate list just like crates you created manually inside Serato.

Absolutely. They complement each other well. Use Vibes to build and export named crates for your vibe categories, then add Serato track colors on top for a quick visual signal in the deck. Your prep work in Vibes reduces the number of tracks you need to color manually.

Methodology