Update at NAMM 2026
At the 2026 NAMM show, Ben Israel from Yamaha’s Content and Research Development Center explained The MIDI Project Container File format.
The SMF 2 container format is intended to deliver multiple tracks of MIDI data and other tracks of media including Audio, Video and Notation on a single timeline.
The set of tracks and media used in the file are enumerated and arranged in a Manifest file in XML format.
Paul Wamsley from Dorico is part of the SMF2 team and plans to release open source software that implements the Container format and also does conversion between MIDI 1.0 to MIDI 2.0 data.
This is also all part of the MIDI Association and its members to provide developer tools to anyone wanting to implement MIDI 2.0.
Most of those tools can be found at MIDI2.dev.
Media types supported in the SMF2 Container Format
● MIDI Clip Files (for MIDI 1.0 and MIDI 2.0)
● Musical Notation (MusicXML [W3C01] or PDF [ISO01])
● Audio Files
● Video Files
● Lyrics: may be in MIDI Clip Files and/or in Musical Notation files.
● Metadata – XML and MIDI Message
The MIDI Project Container File format has two main use cases.
● Distribution/publishing of content that includes both MIDI and any of the file types listed above
● Data exchange between software and hardware applications that include both MIDI and any of the file types listed above. For example, rich media data exchange between two DAWs from two different companies that include MIDI, Audio, Video and notation on a timeline.
This is very useful container format as people with different DAWs, different studio setups (audio interfaces and monitoring systems) and plugins can still collaborate on projects together.