The first priority is Theatrical (limited), which is why this one is wrong. As I understand it, the decision to use the limited release date first was based on major movies being in limited release in December, then wide in January, giving those titles a later release year if theatrical was priority 1. The Revenant is a recent such example.

To fix this for Cabin Fever I changed the Mexican limited release date to a standard theatrical release. If someone should be upset about this we can have a new discussion.

That makes sense, but would it possibly make more sense to group all Theatrical releases together (limited and general), and take the earliest year from that population? That seems to be more reliable than generally prioritizing limited releases. The release of Cabin Fever to Mexico in 2004 may have accurately been a limited release, so now the accuracy of the data could have been compromised to accommodate the release year calculation.

I can't recall which specific movies they were, but I know I've seen other release years that were incorrect, and updating the way it works might help everyone out. I've offered before, but I'm a software engineer who would be happy to volunteer to make such a change if it's deemed appropriate.

You are of course correct about that temporary fix. Let's wait and see if the admin takes a look here. He will be able to give a better response. Thanks.

I'm bumping an old thread for this, hope that's ok.

I was looking at Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter, which is listed on TMDb as 2015, while IMDb and Wikipedia agree that this film is from 2014.

Looking at the release dates on IMDb, it seems in 2014 this film was only playing in film festivals. So my question is: does TMDb not count film festivals on purpose, even if this means the year then differs from what is generally accepted on other websites?

Also, in the TMDb documentation it states: "The primary release date, if set, is used as the year..." This makes it sound as if there is a flag you can set on a release date to mark it as the primary release date. But I see no such option when editing release dates. Am I misunderstanding the documentation?

(Another problematic example is Winter Passing, which is generally considered a 2005 film, but is listed on TMDb as 2006.)

Looking at the release dates on IMDb, it seems in 2014 this film was only playing in film festivals. So my question is: does TMDb not count film festivals on purpose, even if this means the year then differs from what is generally accepted on other websites?

For the display date we always use first theatrical, correct. However, it only matters when viewing the entry on site here. See for example Kumiko on Letterboxd, where the same data is used but another display date is chosen.

Also, in the TMDb documentation it states: "The primary release date, if set, is used as the year..." This makes it sound as if there is a flag you can set on a release date to mark it as the primary release date. But I see no such option when editing release dates. Am I misunderstanding the documentation?

You are not misunderstanding. The documentation is not up to date. Travis will have to change it.

Another problematic example is Winter Passing, which is generally considered a 2005 film, but is listed on TMDb as 2006

I made some changes to the release dates, but again it is by design to use the first theatrical as display date (the two screenings in 2005 were festival premieres). There are many similar ones in the database.

@lineker said:

For the display date we always use first theatrical, correct. However, it only matters when viewing the entry on site here. See for example Kumiko on Letterboxd, where the same data is used but another display date is chosen.

Ah yes, of course, when using the API, you can just request all release dates and pick the one you want yourself.

Ok, thanks for the reply!

I was very happy to find this thread. Thanks for the information.

I assumed that "Premiere" would be the highest priority for setting the release year, but it looks like "Theatrical (Limited)" takes precedent.