Write your first overlay rule

A preset draws the same badge on everything that qualifies. A rule is one you write: draw this, on these, when that is true. Worked example — mark films rated 8 or better.

1. Overlays → New overlay. The first field is Start from a template. Pick one whose shape is close to what you want and edit it, or take Blank overlay if you would rather begin from nothing. Starting from a template is the faster path the first time, because the placement and text styling are already sensible.
2. Name it for what it means, not what it looks like. "Highly rated" survives you changing the colour; "Gold badge" does not.
3. Set the Scope. Which kind of thing this can land on — films, shows, seasons, episodes, collections. A rule about episode ratings has no business on a film, and scope is what says so.
4. Pick Libraries, if you are asked. This appears only when you have more than one library of the same type. With a single Movies and a single TV Shows library the scope pills already say everything there is to say. Leaving it empty means every library.
5. **Build the condition under When.** Add a condition, choose its field and operator, and give it a value — for this example, Plex rating, is at least, 8.0. Group conditions with ALL or ANY; nest a group inside another when you need "this, and either of those".
6. **Choose how it is drawn, under Draw. Four shapes, and they behave differently: | Shape | What it is | | --- | --- | | Badge | A pill with a shaded plate behind it. Badges stack at a shared anchor and scale with the poster. | | Text | The same words with no plate. | | Banner | A full-width strip across the poster. Badges clear it rather than overlapping. | | Image | A PNG you upload. It scales by its own pixels**, not the poster's, so a small file stays small on a large poster. |
7. Place it with the anchor, offset and size. The anchor is a nine-point grid, the offset nudges it off that point, and Size % scales it.
8. Watch the live preview. It re-renders about half a second after you stop typing, so you are looking at the actual result rather than a description of it. Adjust and watch, rather than saving and checking in Plex.
9. Save. The overlay run applies it on its next pass, or press Draw every overlay to do it now. That skips posters already up to date.