I’d like to suggest a new feature for Trakt.tv: the ability to mark TV shows as “Abandoned” so they no longer appear in the “In Progress” list or count as unfinished.
Why is this feature needed?
With the overwhelming amount of audiovisual content available today, it’s important to manage time efficiently and remove shows that we’ve chosen not to continue. Currently, the only options are: Mark as “Watched” (even if we didn’t finish it). Manually ignore it every time it appears in the progress list. Leave it as “In Progress,” even if we don’t intend to watch it.
None of these options are ideal.
An optimized method for deciding when to abandon a show
Some people follow structured rules to decide when to stop watching a series. A simple and efficient method is 3-40-2, which works like this: Single-season shows → If it doesn’t engage after 3 episodes, drop it. Movies → Give them 40 minutes before deciding. Multi-season shows → If it hasn’t improved by season 2, abandon it.
This approach helps viewers avoid wasting too much time on content they don’t enjoy.
A new “Abandoned” status in the progress menu. Filtering abandoned shows so they don’t appear in the “In Progress” list. A dedicated “Abandoned Shows” section in the user profile (for future reconsideration).
Benefits: Keeps watchlists clean and more realistic. Prevents shows from staying in “In Progress” when they’re not actually being watched. Helps users manage their time better in an era of content overload.
I believe this feature would enhance the user experience and make Trakt.tv a better tool for tracking what we truly want to watch. What do you all think? Would you like to see this option added?
I understand that these are the current options, but I believe none of them are truly suitable for managing content that we have decided not to continue.
• Marking it as “Watched” is not a valid solution because we haven’t actually watched it, and there should be a way to indicate that we have no interest in finishing it.
• Leaving it as “In Progress” makes the list longer than necessary.
• Manually ignoring it each time it appears could be an option, but as far as I can see, this feature is only available in the app and not on the web version (at least, I can’t find the eye icon on PC).
This is why I believe an “Abandoned” option would help keep content tracking more organized and realistic. Is there a possibility of considering this implementation in the future?
Are you saying you’ve tried using the Hide option available on both web and mobile apps as pointed out above? I’m failing to see how it’s not what you’re after - Hidden shows keep your history intact and just hide it from showing up in Progress (and Up Next, etc.) + you can hide from calendar also to stop it showing up in the Calendar (and Upcoming Schedule).
It seems like the management is a valid issue, alongside visibility, and perhaps renaming ‘Hide’ to ‘Dropped’ or ‘Abandoned’ seems like a solution to the confusion perhaps?
Is there something else missing in regard to this confusion? Like being able to see that a show was dropped on the show page somewhere? And/or perhaps having a way to drop or un-drop/resume a show from the show page also (or automatically if you add another episode to history, though personally I think manual would make more sense)?
The only other thing I’ve seen that seems viable/reasonable, for lack of better wording, which would definitely be a new implementation of some sort, is having multiple levels of ‘hidden’ so that something could be removed from Up Next, but stay in Progress (eg. Separating the hidden items WATCHED PROGRESS & UP NEXT - #3 by otakunet21). Does anyone have a really good concrete example of this? Personally I feel like based on ‘watched date’ sorting the items that you no longer care too much about in the short term just sink to the bottom of the list and therefore matter less anyway - Perhaps people are having issues if they’re using a different sort order which is keeping an item near the top of their Up Next?
My progress (if you filter out completed) definitely has some items in there that I won’t get to for a while (eg. Kitchen Nightmares, 8 out of cats countdown, etc.) so perhaps there should just be a better way to make items you’re ‘temporarily’ dropping (or say, putting ‘on hold’) sink to the end of the list. An example being a smart sort rather than having to manually mark something as “on hold” and keep managing it (or if its manual, perhaps this one should automatically unhide if you add an episode to history again, whereas IMO dropping should be permanently dropped unless manually undropping).
How the “Abandoned” Option Could Work on Trakt.tv
Hey Trakt.tv team and community! Thanks for taking the time to read my suggestion. I’d love to share how this feature could be added in a simple and useful way for everyone.
A New Status: “Abandoned”
Right now, if you decide to stop watching a show, you only have two options: mark it as “Watched” (even if you didn’t finish it) or leave it in “In Progress” forever. The idea is to add an “Abandoned” option, so you can mark shows and movies you don’t plan to finish without them counting as incomplete.
Remove Abandoned Shows from “In Progress”
If you abandon a show, it makes sense that it disappears from your “In Progress” list. That way, when you check what you’re currently watching, you’ll only see what you actually want to continue. This would save you from having to manually ignore shows you’re no longer interested in every time you check your progress.
A New Section: “Abandoned Shows”
Instead of completely removing abandoned titles, they could be moved to a new section in your profile: “Abandoned”, where you could see what you’ve dropped and, if you change your mind, pick them back up later.
How Would It Work? An “Abandon” button alongside the tracking options for each show or movie. Once marked as abandoned, it would no longer appear in “In Progress” and wouldn’t count as unfinished. If you decide to give it another shot, just remove the “Abandoned” tag and continue where you left off.
Why Would This Improve Trakt.tv? Keeps your watchlist cleaner and more organized. Prevents shows you’re not watching from staying in your profile forever. Helps you manage your time better in an era of content overload.
With this option, Trakt.tv would be an even better tool for tracking what you actually want to watch. What do you think? Would you like to see this feature added?
I have no idea how it should be named when hiding previous seasons (for example with a daily news show, you’d likely not be interested in earlier seasons)… maybe that can be just “Hide this season” in the progress section? (which would also hide it from up next).
It would be really neat if you could see that you’ve dropped a show when on the show page. I think that was requested/suggested before, and I like it. Would also solve the problem of a HUGE list of hidden items some people might have in their settings.
I agree with only manual unhiding/undropping. Maybe it could be a setting, but I like to be in control of the data I add, it’s why I don’t use any scrobbling stuff haha.
I don’t have any issue with how it’s handled currently and I would only be annoyed if I had to hide stuff more than once.
I have no actual use case for that.
People like this won’t admit to being wrong…or better yet, they’ve invested so much of their time in making the request that they won’t accept the given solution. It’s not that I don’t like the idea of an “abandoned” option, but I do agree that the “Hide this show” is a valid solution. They feel entitled…
Request: Remove Abandoned Shows from “In Progress”
Solution: Already done with Hide
Request: A New Section: “Abandoned Shows”
Solution: Already done with Hidden Items in Settings (https://trakt.tv/settings/hidden/watched/title)
Potential Improvement: Could/should be more visible and drop status should be visible in the show page IMO.
Conclusion:
Hide does these things: Keeps your watchlist cleaner and more organized. Prevents shows you’re not watching from staying in your profile forever. * Helps you manage your time better in an era of content overload.
* they do show in History still, but that seems to be the point - they don’t show in Progress which matches the suggestion.
Anyway, I’m happy to be shown why Hide doesn’t do what they suggested here.
Thanks for the thoughts - yeah not sure how season level stuff works, hiding kind of makes sense there, but using the same ‘drop’ term probably works too.
Yeah I can understand not bloating the show pages with things, but as long as there’s something to indicate it’s hidden (and perhaps select/hover it to see details) would be a huge improvement.
Yeah I see you’re using an ‘Episodes Left’ sort so that changes a lot of things. The way I see an additional ‘hide’ option such as On Hold would be an optional status where the default is the ‘hard drop’ but optionally can ‘soft drop’. Aka you never have to do both in order to fully hide it like you can do right now. Like you can’t have it “On Hold” AND “Dropped”, only one. And considering anything like “On Hold” would be a new feature it’s more likely to not be an option for a while (if at all etc, but I like the idea if its valuable for a lot of people)
It would be nice if hiding the show from up next didn’t hide it from the progress. Not that anyone follows me, but it would be nice to have my progress fully visible and shows that I’m not watching anymore are still visible to others but wont appear in my up next list since I don’t want to watch them. I’ve made a couple of personal lists for this for my anime tracking.
I want people to be able to see everything I’ve watched. If that is already the case of how the Hide mechanic works then a rename would definitely be better.
Nah, Hide will hide it from Progress for you and others. Does that mean, as you suggested in the other thread, that a ‘softer drop’ (eg. On hold) might be what you’re after? I imagine it would show up in progress still - either optionally filtered out like you can with completed, or pushed to a different section at the bottom etc. It wouldn’t be in up next though (aka not on your dashboard).
yeah that’s exactly what I’d be looking for, and I assume others are as well. I’d want to have it removed from the Up Next list but still be visible in my progress without having to hide multiple seasons just for that effect. Like in my progress I watched two seasons of “So You Think You Can Dance?” so it would show up in my Up Next but I may not watch every season. And I don’t want to go through and hide every season I havent watched which bloats the Hidden Items area, or I don’t want to hide the showing altogether so that people couldn’t see it.
Mark as “Watched” (even if we didn’t finish it).
Single-season shows → If it doesn’t engage after 3 episodes, drop it.
A new “Abandoned” status in the progress menu.
The idea is to add an “Abandoned” option, so you can mark shows and movies you don’t plan to finish without them counting as incomplete.
This would save you from having to manually ignore shows you’re no longer interested in every time you check your progress.
“Abandoned”, where you could see what you’ve dropped and, if you change your mind, pick them back up later.
An “Abandon” button alongside the tracking options for each show or movie.
Keeps your watchlist cleaner and more organized.
