This wikiHow teaches you how to add or change covers for music albums in Groove and Windows Media Player. Keep in mind that some Windows 10 computers don't come with Windows Media Player. If you want to edit MP3 files to display the metadata of the inset image, you can use several MP3 bookmark editor programs.
Step
Method 1 of 5: Manually Adding Album Covers to Groove
Step 1. Find and download album art
Open a web browser of your choice and search for the name of the music album, followed by the phrase " album art " (eg "divide album art"), select and right-click the image you want to download, then select “ Save ” in the right-click drop-down menu.
- In some browsers and/or search engines, you can select the “ Images ” at the top of the page to see a list of album covers.
- Your browser may ask you to specify a downloads storage directory on your computer. If yes, just click on the folder “ Desktop ” on the left side of the command window.
Step 2. Open the “Start” menu
Click the Windows logo in the lower-left corner of the screen.
Step 3. Type in groove
The computer will then search for the Groove Music app.
Step 4. Click Groove Music
It's the CD icon at the top of the "Start" window. The Groove Music app will open after that.
Step 5. Click My music
It's in the top-left corner of the Groove window. A list of music stored in Groove will be displayed after that.
If you don't see the option, click the “ ☰ ” first in the upper left corner of the window.
Step 6. Click the Albums tab
It's at the top of the Groove window.
Step 7. Select an album
Click the album whose cover you want to edit.
You cannot edit album art for songs separately
Step 8. Click Edit info
This tab is at the top of the album page. The "Edit Album Info" window will open for the selected album.
For songs that don't have albums, or with albums showing as " Unknown Album ", the " Edit info " button will not be available. Therefore, you need right click song first, choose " Edit Info ”, type in the new “album title”, then click “ Save ”.
Step 9. Click the album art
The cover is a square image in the upper-left corner of the "Edit Album Info" window. The File Explorer window will appear after that.
If no covers match the album, the cover frame will be filled with a pencil icon in the lower-left corner of the window
Step 10. Select an image
Click the cover you downloaded earlier, or select another image already on your computer.
If the File Explorer window displays a folder other than the cover storage directory, click the folder you want to access first on the left side of the window
Step 11. Click Open
It's in the lower-right corner of the window. After that, the cover will be added to the selected album.
Step 12. Click Save
It's at the bottom of the "Edit Album Info" window. The album will now show a new cover as it plays.
Method 2 of 5: Adding a Cover to an Album from the Internet on Windows Media Player
Step 1. Make sure you have purchased the music whose data needs to be edited
Windows Media Player does not support automatic updates for music not purchased from the online store.
If you didn't purchase the music on the album that needs editing, you'll most likely need to add the album art manually
Step 2. Make sure the computer is connected to the internet network
In order for Windows Media Player to automatically search for album art, Windows must be connected to the internet. As long as you can load web pages, Windows Media Player can connect to online databases.
Step 3. Open the “Start” menu
Click the Windows logo in the lower-left corner of the screen.
Step 4. Type in windows media player
If the cursor doesn't show the text field at the bottom of the “Start” window, you will need to click on the text field first.
Step 5. Click Windows Media Player
The app is marked by a blue square icon with an orange and white “play” button at the top of the “Start” menu. Windows Media Player will open after that.
Step 6. Click Library
It's in the top-left corner of the window.
Step 7. Click the Music tab
This tab is on the left side of the Windows Media Player window.
Step 8. Locate the album you want to update
Browse your music library until you find the album you need to edit.
Albums that don't have covers are indicated by a musical note icon on a gray background
Step 9. Right-click the album art
The cover is on the left side of the playlist. After that, a drop-down menu will be displayed.
- If your mouse doesn't have a right-click button, click the right side of the mouse or use two fingers to click the mouse button.
- If your computer uses a trackpad instead of a mouse, use two fingers to touch the trackpad or press the button on the lower right side of the trackpad.
Step 10. Click Update album info
It's in the middle of the drop-down menu. Matching album covers will be searched on the internet. If available, the image will be displayed as the selected album cover.
- If no cover appears, you will need to add the cover manually.
- It may take a few minutes for the album art to appear, and you may even need to restart Windows Media Player.
Method 3 of 5: Manually Adding the Cover to Windows Media Player
Step 1. Find and download album art
Open a web browser of your choice and search for the name of the music album, followed by the phrase " album art " (eg "divide album art"), select and right-click the image you want to download, then select “ Save ” in the right-click drop-down menu.
- In some browsers and/or search engines, you can select the “ Images ” at the top of the page to see a list of album covers.
- Your browser may ask you to specify a downloads storage directory on your computer. If yes, just click on the folder “ Desktop ” on the left side of the command window.
Step 2. Copy the downloaded album art
Go to the cover storage directory (e.g. folder “ Downloads ”), click the cover to select it, and press the shortcut Ctrl+C to copy it.
You can also right-click on the image and select “ Copy ” to copy it.
Step 3. Open the “Start” menu
Click the Windows logo in the lower-left corner of the screen.
Step 4. Type in windows media player
If the cursor doesn't immediately display the text field at the bottom of the “Start” window, you will need to click the column first.
Step 5. Click Windows Media Player
The app is marked by a blue square icon with an orange and white “play” button at the top of the “Start” menu. Windows Media Player will run after that.
Step 6. Click Library
It's in the top-left corner of the window.
Step 7. Click the Music tab
This tab is on the left side of the Windows Media Player window.
Step 8. Find the album whose cover you want to update
Browse the library until you find the album you need to edit.
Albums that don't have covers are indicated by a musical note icon on a gray background
Step 9. Right-click the album art
The cover is on the left side of the playlist. After that, a drop-down menu will be displayed.
Step 10. Click Paste album art
It's in the middle of the drop-down menu. You can see the image in the next album cover segment.
- It may take a few seconds for the album art to finish updating.
- If you don't see the option " Paste album art ”, try downloading and copying a small version of the cover.
Method 4 of 5: Editing MP3 Bookmarks with MP3Tag
Step 1. Download and install MP3Tag
MP3Tag is a free program that allows you to edit the bookmarks of any MP3 file at once, including album art. To download and install MP3Tag, follow these steps:
- Visit https://www.mp3tag.de/en/download.html through your computer's web browser.
- Click the link " mp3tagv287assetup.exe ” in the middle of the page.
- Double-click the MP3Tag installation file.
- Click the buttons to skip through the MP3Tag installation tutorial until you are finished installing MP3Tag.
Step 2. Open MP3Tags
Double-click the MP3Tag icon which looks like a diamond with a tick above it. The MP3Tag window will open afterwards.
Step 3. Add music to MP3Tag
MP3Tag will automatically scan for usable MP3 files on your computer, but you can also open specific files by clicking and dragging them into the MP3Tag window.
You can also open a song in MP3Tag by right-clicking the MP3 file and selecting “ Mp3tag ” from the drop-down menu.
Step 4. Select a song
In the main window, click the title of the song you want to edit.
You can select multiple songs at once by pressing and holding down the Ctrl key while clicking each song that needs editing
Step 5. Right-click the album art
You'll find the cover box in the lower-left corner of the window. After that, a drop-down menu will be displayed.
- If there is no album art for the selected song, this box will be empty.
- If your mouse doesn't have a right-click button, click the right side of the mouse or use two fingers to click the mouse.
- If your computer uses a trackpad instead of a mouse, use two fingers to touch the trackpad or press the lower right side of the trackpad.
Step 6. Click Remove cover
It's at the top of the drop-down menu. The old album art will be deleted afterwards.
Step 7. Right-click the album art field
This blank column is where it previously displayed old album covers. The drop-down menu will reload.
Step 8. Click Add cover…
It's at the bottom of the drop-down menu. A File Explorer window will open.
Step 9. Select an image
Go to the directory where the image you want to use is stored, then click the image.
Step 10. Click Open
It's in the lower-right corner of the window. The image will be selected and added to the selected song.
Step 11. Click the “Save” icon
It's a diskette icon in the upper-left corner of the window. You will receive a confirmation message indicating that the MP3 file is now using the selected album art.
Method 5 of 5: Adding a Permanent Marker
Step 1. Understand how this method works
If you want to make sure your song still has the image you chose when it plays on a media player like VLC, you can use an online converter to add album art to your MP3 file.
Some media players such as VLC will recognize tags from the converter compared to other tagging options or methods (eg Groove or MP3Tag)
Step 2. Go to the TagMP3 site
Visit https://tagmp3.net/change-album-art.php through your computer's web browser. This site allows you to burn images to MP3 file metadata so that the MP3 file's album art information can be displayed on all media players.
If you use TagMP3 to add album art to an MP3 file, changing the cover through programs or other bookmark editing features won't work
Step 3. Click Browse Files
It's a purple button in the middle of the window. After that, a File Explorer window will be opened.
Step 4. Select a song
Open the directory where the MP3 file you want to add the album art to, then click the file.
If you want to edit the bookmarks of multiple songs, hold down the Ctrl key while clicking each song you want to edit
Step 5. Click Open
It's in the lower-right corner of the window. Selected songs will be uploaded to the website.
Step 6. Click Choose file
It's a gray button below the old photo cover (or blank cover space) in the " Album Art " section.
You will need to repeat this step and the next two steps for each MP3 file. you want to edit
Step 7. Select an image
Open the directory where the image you want to use as the album art is stored, then click the image to select it.
Step 8. Click Open
It's in the lower-right corner of the window. After that, the image will be added to TagMP3, although it doesn't appear in the album art preview window immediately.
Step 9. Burn the image or image to an MP3 file
Scroll down the page and click “ DONE! GENERATE NEW MP3 ”, then wait for the tagging to complete.
Step 10. Download the MP3 file
Click Download File 1 ” to download the newly tagged MP3 file to your computer.
- You can see that the MP3 file has a string of letters and numbers as its title. However, the file will display the appropriate song information when played in Media Player, iTunes, Groove, and VLC.
- If you are uploading multiple files at once, click the link “ Download Files 2 ” and the next one to download other files.
