---
title: playbackMode
framework: usd
role: article
role_heading: Article
path: usd/playbackmode
---

# playbackMode

Metadata that controls animation idling until a behavior takes over.

## Overview

Overview Set the playbackMode metadata on the document’s stage, that is, the outermost container for scene description. For more information about setting stage metadata, see UsdStage > Stage Metadata. When an asset specifies playback metadata and a start animation, the animation plays automatically and loops until a trigger executes the StartAnimationAction. After the start animation completes, the asset’s behaviors (Preliminary_Behavior) take control of the animation. If you don’t define a start animation for the asset, this property indicates whether an animation should restart after it finishes playing. Declaration uniform token playbackMode = "loop" (            allowedTokens = ["none","loop"] ) Playback Modes Specify an initial idling animation The following metadata demonstrates playbackMode for an asset that defines a StartAnimationAction. This example sets playbackMode to loop, idling the animation in a perpetual replay until a trigger executes the start action. #usda 1.0 (     endTimeCode = 300     startTimeCode = 1     timeCodesPerSecond = 30     playbackMode = "loop"     upAxis = "Y" )

def Xform "AnimatedModel" {     def Xform "body"     {         double3 xformOp:translate.timeSamples = { ... }         uniform token[] xformOpOrder = ["xformOp:translate"]         ...     }     ... }

## See Also

### Animation

- [autoPlay](usd/autoplay.md)