QBittorrent stuck on Downloading Metadata

[DragonCayenne]

I had been using other torrent clients (with limited success) and heard that QBit was better. The majority of my torrent downloads now get stuck on Downloading Metadata. I am using a VPN and have selected "Any Interface" in Qbitt's Advanced Settings section. I have tried each of the individual interfaces but that didn't fix it.
I have even tried different VPN server locations but that still did not fix it.
Also, some of the downloads get stuck on "Stalled."
Will someone please let me know what is going on here and what I can do to fix it?
Many thanks!

[Peter]

(This post is about public torrents, not private ones. Receiving metadata occurs when you are trying to download a magnet link, but your client just can't connect properly.)

VPN renders you passive (firewalled), unless you use a good provider (ie.: Mullvad, Windscribe) that lets you do port forwarding.

You can...
- Use private trackers; these usually work fine with passive connections but seeding, keeping a ratio will be very hard
- Use a good VPN provider.
- In Settings -> Bittorrent -> on bottom, there is a "Automatically add these trackers.." option, and you can use ngosang's public tracker list. Just copy the whole list like "ALL" ( https://github.com/ngosang/trackerslist ... rs_all.txt ) and paste it in there. If your torrents are already added, you can go into Trackers tab on bottom, right click in the box and add new trackers.

[kakerrisk]

This is happening to me now too. I updated a few weeks ago.

I can download the same torrent in uTorrent Web without issue. But qBitTorrent is a problem. Stuck on 0% and Downloading Metatada.

I have added the tracker list as recommended by Peter. Still having the same issue.

[adventureaardvark]

I have had this same issue, infrequently, with some torrents. I have been able to "jump start" the download by starting it with the VPN off, pausing it once it's established, and then restarting the VPN and continuing.

This is not ideal for obvious reasons but it does work for me.

[eshichi]

(This post is about public torrents, not private ones. Receiving metadata occurs when you are trying to download a magnet link, but your client just can't connect properly.)

VPN renders you passive (firewalled), unless you use a good provider (ie.: Mullvad, Windscribe) that lets you do port forwarding.

You can...
- Use private trackers; these usually work fine with passive connections but seeding, keeping a ratio will be very hard
- Use a good VPN provider.
- In Settings -> Bittorrent -> on bottom, there is a "Automatically add these trackers.." option, and you can use ngosang's public tracker list. Just copy the whole list like "ALL" ( https://github.com/ngosang/trackerslist ... rs_all.txt ) and paste it in there. If your torrents are already added, you can go into Trackers tab on bottom, right click in the box and add new trackers.

DUDE YOU ARE AN ABSOLUTE GOD! Thank you so much. Ive been dealing with this for such a long time, and ive got multiple VPNs providers, and lord...lets just say nothing elses worked.

I never frequent this forum, but i logged in just to thank you sir!

[bob2306]

FWIW, I have no port forwarding on my VPN, I've never added trackers, and magnet links work just fine for me.

Very rarely you can get into a situation on dying torrents where no one in the torrent can accept incoming connections, but that usually goes away in the end if you have patience. In my experience persistent failures are more often caused by no one in the torrent actually having the metadata - but that's really an indication of a completely dead torrent.

I don't know what causes a severe problem with magnet links, but it's definitely not an automatic consequence of not having port forwarding. My guess would be a problem with DHT.

The advice about private trackers is a bit misleading, lots of public indexing sites still provide torrent files, you don't have to go private to avoid magnet links.