How to Set Cue Points Automatically in Serato DJ (Cues That Travel)

Short answer

Serato DJ Pro and Serato DJ Lite cannot place hot cues for you: Analyze Files sets the beatgrid, the Auto Loop buttons make a loop of a fixed length, Smart Crates sort tracks by their tags, but the eight cue slots stay empty until you press them. The way to fill them automatically is to run a cue detector over the files and write the result into the Serato Markers2 tag inside each track, because that tag, not the database, is where Serato keeps hot cues and saved loops. MixGoat's Cues & Loops tool does this on your computer: detection is free, saving is part of the GOAT plan, and the cues appear in Serato the next time the track loads. Because they live in the file, they survive a move to another laptop and are picked up by Rekordbox when it imports the same files.

Step by step

1. 1

   Know what Serato will and will not do on its own

   In Serato DJ Pro, select tracks and press Analyze Files (the button in the library header while no deck is loaded) to get a beatgrid and key; Setup → DJ Preferences → On Song Load can start playback from the first cue point, but only if one exists. Serato Flip records cue presses and Serato Play is the no-hardware player. None of them decides where a cue should go, so the cue and loop panel starts empty on every new track.

2. 2

   Load the tracks into MixGoat

   Open MixGoat → Prepare → Cues & Loops and add files, a folder or a playlist. Serato's library lives in ~/Music/_Serato_ (Serato 3.x and Lite) or in master.sqlite on Serato DJ Pro 4.x; MixGoat finds both automatically, and Change location… in the sidebar lets you point it at a _Serato_ folder on an external drive instead.

3. 3

   Match the settings to Serato's eight slots

   Set Max hot cues to 8, because Serato has exactly eight cue slots and MixGoat turns anything past the cap into memory cues, which Serato does not have and therefore never sees. The Save cues as switch is irrelevant here: Serato always receives hot cues whatever you pick. Under Detect loops, Max loops of up to 8 fills Serato's eight saved loop slots; loops sit in their own slot bank, so a track can carry eight cues and eight loops.

4. 4

   Turn on the Serato targets

   Under Write cues & loops to, enable Serato, and switch on Embed cue tags in the audio files. That second toggle is the one that matters for Serato: it writes a Serato Markers2 GEOB frame into each MP3, WAV and AIFF (FLAC is skipped for Serato cue writes). Keep original files untouched writes the tag into a copy named Track [cues].wav instead; Serato treats that copy as a separate track, so leave it off unless you want untouched originals.

5. 5

   Detect, review, then save

   Detect runs on your machine and is free on every plan; the strongest positions get pads 1 to 8 left to right, coloured red, orange, yellow, green, aqua, blue, purple, pink, and Serato shows those colours from the tag. Fix anything you disagree with, then Save. If Serato is running MixGoat warns you but writes anyway, since the destination is the file; close Serato first so its cached copy of the tag does not overwrite yours later.

6. 6

   Make Serato read the new tag

   Open Serato and load the track to a deck: Serato reads Serato Markers2 on load and the cue and loop panel fills in. If a track still shows the old cues, open the Files panel and press Rescan ID3 Tags, which forces Serato to re-read tags for the selected tracks or the whole library.

Where Serato keeps cues, and why it changes everything

Rekordbox, Traktor and VirtualDJ store cues in a database keyed by file path; Serato writes them into the audio file. For MP3, AIFF and WAV that is an ID3v2 GEOB frame with the description Serato Markers2, a base64 blob listing every hot cue (position, colour, name) and every saved loop (start, end, colour, locked flag). Sister frames Serato Analysis, Serato Autotags (BPM) and Serato BeatGrid sit next to it; MixGoat writes Analysis and Autotags too when they are missing, which is what VirtualDJ needs to recognise the file as Serato-tagged.

The practical consequences: copying a track to another computer copies its cues; a track that Serato lists as missing still has its cues the moment it is relocated; and Rekordbox reads the Serato tag when it imports the file, so a library cued for Serato arrives in Rekordbox with its hot cues. The one thing the tag cannot hold is a memory cue, which is why MixGoat's Rekordbox-only memory cues never reach Serato.

Serato features people mistake for automatic cues

Smart Crates build crates from rules on tags (BPM range, key, genre, date added); they never touch cues. Analyze Files computes the beatgrid, key and overview waveform, and Set Beatgrid in the beatgrid editor lets you correct the downbeat, but no cue is placed. The Auto Loop buttons in the loop panel create a loop of 1/32 to 32 beats at the playhead when you press them, live. Serato DJ Lite reads the same tag as Pro, so the cues are all there when you upgrade.

The manual route and where a detector fits

If you prefer to cue by hand, Serato's layout is fast: press an empty pad on the fly to set a cue, Shift plus pad to clear it, set a loop with In and Out then press an empty loop slot to save it. The problem is scale: eight cues on 2,000 tracks is 16,000 presses. A detector gives you a first pass to correct rather than a blank panel, and since MixGoat writes standard Serato tags you can still edit every cue inside Serato afterwards. MixGoat's model scores positions by confidence; it does not label them intro, drop or break, so name the pads yourself if you rely on names. The generic guide at mixgoat.com/guides/automatic-cue-points covers the sensitivity and spacing settings in depth.

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