Its come to my attention that a lot of people are having issues syncing iPads, iPhones and iPods to iTunes. It would seem that even though the device is set up to sync with iTunes correctly, sometimes it just feels like being a jerk and not syncing. I’m a big fan of Apple products, but it’s no secret that syncing with iTunes can be a little buggy. In this article are a bunch of methods that have worked for other people, and hopefully will work for you.
First if you simply need help understanding how to sync with iTunes or how to set it up you can check my other post, Sync your iOS device with iTunes over Wi-Fi.
These fixes are what I have found through hours of reading articles and forums, as well as speaking to people through twitter and other online resources to find out what has the highest chances of working. These instructions may work for you, however nothing is guaranteed as it’s pretty much trial and error. Try each solution, then attempt to sync, if it doesn’t work, go to the next solution and so on. I will put them in order of easiest and quickest methods, down to the more drastic.
- If syncing over Wi-Fi, make sure both your computer and iOS device are connected to the same Wi-Fi network.
- Restart your iOS device, restart computer and restart your wireless router if your device syncs over Wi-Fi.
- Plug in your iPad, iPhone or iPod into iTunes. Uncheck “Sync with this [your device] over Wi-Fi”. Click Apply. Check “Sync with this [your device] over Wi-Fi”. Click Apply. It also may help to disable “Home Sharing” and then re-enable it.
- Uninstalling iTunes and then re-installing it may work. If you take this route make sure to do a backup first.
- If you just want your iOS device to sync and don’t care if it syncs over Wi-Fi or by plugging it in with the cable, then just deselect “Sync with this [your device] over Wi-Fi”.
Remember that with the new iTunes (11) the devices tab has moved from the left side to the top right hand side of iTunes. If none of the above made iTunes recognize or connect to your device you could always restore your device (wipe everything off it then restore it with a backup). I have heard many people fix most syncing issues with this method. However make sure you have made a backup if you take this route, so that you can restore all your settings and apps ect, when you’re done restoring.
Instructions for restoring your device are at the bottom of this article.
If you want to bring back the left side-panel that shows all the devices connected, Music, Movies ect. Then go to the menu bar in iTunes -> View -> Show Sidebar.
- If you have “Manually manage music and videos” checked, try unchecking it and then syncing. After recheck it and try syncing. Also make sure you have the music or video selected when syncing.
- If your apps aren’t syncing properly try to deauthorize and then reauthorize your computer. To do this, open iTunes, go to the menu bar and select -> Store -> “Deauthorize This Computer”. After it’s done, simply select “Authorize This Computer”.
- In your device window under the Summary tab, check to see if “Sync only checked songs and videos” is checked, if it is make sure you have the music or video selected when syncing.
- If your music isn’t syncing, go to the Music tab in your iOS devices window in iTunes and uncheck “Sync Music”. Click Apply. Once done, check “Sync Music”. Try the same thing if it’s something else like your Movies that isn’t syncing.
- The only options that I have selected under the iTunes summary page is “Sync this iPhone over Wi-Fi” and “Prefer standard definition videos”. Syncing working well for me with these options selected, maybe it would also work for you.
- Restoring your device may work. Instructions on how to do this are at the bottom of the page.
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Go to the devices window and select the “On this [your device] tab. Make sure the song is checked, once checked it should change from grey to black and then be playable.
- An issue that is surprisingly common when trying to sync with iTunes via the USB cable is simply that the USB cable is faulty. I know it may sound strange, but if nothing here works, then you may need to use a different/new USB cable or even trying syncing over Wi-Fi.
- If when/after you sync you notice that the song is greyed out on your iOS Device then the song may not be in the proper format. Right click on the song in the iTunes and select “Create AAC version”. This will create a new version of the music file. Delete the original song file and sync the newly created AAC version.
- Check to see if you have “Manually manage music and videos” or “Sync only checked songs and videos” selected in the Summary tab of your devices window, if it is make sure you have the music or video selected when syncing.
- Go to the Settings app on your iOS device and then tap “iTunes & App Stores”, turn off Automatic Downloads for Music, Apps and Books. Connect your device to iTunes, go through the device page and uncheck “Sync Music”, then click Apply. After it’s done check “Sync Music”. Turn Automatic Downloads back on if you like.
- Sign out of all iTunes accounts on your iOS device and iTunes, then sign back in.
- There is a very good chance that restoring your iOS device will also fix this issue.
Restoring your device will wipe everything off of it, so if you want to restore everything make sure you make a backup!
- Disconnect the USB cable from the iPad, iPhone or iPod
- Launch iTunes
- Turn off your iOS device. (Press and hold the Home and Power button until it turns off)
- Press and hold the Home button while you reconnect the USB cable
- Keep holding down the home button until iTunes shows an alert saying that a device in recovery mode has been detected.
Sometimes restoring your device and setting up as a new device instead of restoring from a backup works as well, however this should be only used if nothing else works.
If you need help backing up and restoring check out my other article: 2 ways to backup your iPod, iPhone and iPad
If you had a problem syncing and have found a different method that works, please post it in the comments section below.
I have tried over three hours to fix my problem with every advice available on the net: My MacBook Air shows no problem syncing my iphone 5 with itunes 11, however the songs i choose to be synced are grey and have the little circle, they can only be seen on iTunes on my MacBook, not on my iphone. iTunes doesn’t give me any error message or idea why this isn’t working. The rest of the syncing is ok, it also syncs to my ipad. I’ve tried sync/unsync, connect/disconnect, wifi/usb, manually/automatically, autofill, deleted my iphone from the backup list, I rebooted, turned itunes match off, everything – nothing helps. Last thing I haven’t tried is to restore my iPhone, because iTunes tells me that some items I’ve purchased are going to get lost because they can’t be transfered into the library. I’m getting frustrated and would much appreciate any more help.
Thanks for being so descriptive, it defiantly helps me understand the issue.
1. Were the songs purchased from the iTunes Store? If so it may be an issue with the song being downloaded (synced through iCloud).
2. Are you able to manually transfer media from your device into your iTunes library? File -> Devices -> Transfer Purchases from [your devices name here].
Thanks for your quick answer.
1. I would say about half the songs were downloaded from the store.
2. This has worked!
I found out that the syncing process isn’t functioning properly with my mail either. If I delete items on one device, it doesn’t delete them from the other devices. Could this help finding a solution to the problem?
1. Is it just the songs that have been downloaded from the store that are greyed out?
2. That’s good that at least that works, it narrows it down a little bit more. Means there is a high probability that it isn’t a problem with iTunes sync, and more so iCloud sync. I assume now you would be able to restore if you needed to without loosing your purchased media?
3. Mail syncing can be buggy, I notice it myself all the time. It usually fixes itself… or just doesn’t work half the time.
It does sound like it could be a problem with iCloud sync/download. Try disabling and then enabling automatic downloads on your iOS device (settings -> iTunes and App Stores)
1. All songs are greyed out. No matter which source.
2. No, still can’t be done. Same pop up shows.
3. I’ve tried to off/on the icloud syncing – this did not fix the problem. Should I just turn the iCloud syncing off and use a USB cable?
I’ve got another information that might be useful, I can’t download purchased songs from the iTunes store (iTunes>More>Downloads) on my iPhone.
Could it be, that I am not allowed to play those songs on more than three devices? Since I have changed laptop several times, now ipad, iPhone could it be that those songs are blocked or something?
1. Turned into step 5
2. Even after manually transferring media from the device successfully it still says you have purchased items on the device that would be lost if restored?
3. I actually don’t believe that turning iCloud syncing off will do anything to help out.
4. It may very well be that you have to many devices authorized. If I’m not wrong I believe you are allowed to have 5 devices authorized to one account. To manage the authorized device open iTunes -> Go to the iTunes Store -> Go to your account -> Sign in -> click Manage Devices. Remove all the devices that you don’t want authorized to your account.
5. If nothing works, you may have no choice but to restore your device. Of course I’d also suggest getting in contact with Apple Support.
deleting and restoring my ipad helped
Thanks for your advice, it really worked, what a pain that iTunes can’t just sync properly in the first place!
I don’t know what did the trick, but I could restore without any loss of data after all and restoring fixed my problem :D Thanks a lot for your help anyone. You guys just made me very happy!
Oh – special thanks to Damien – awesome service!
Hey Carola, I’m glad to hear syncing is finally working for you. And thank you for the complement as well as coming back to let me know it’s working for you now :)
Be sure to check the location of your iTunes library. I keep my music on a media server not the C: drive. For reasons unknown to me, iTunes will revert back to the default C: drive location once or twice a year. It can’t sync if it can’t find the music.
Interesting, I’ve never seen or heard of that happening before. Thanks for letting us know.
Hey Damien, I’m really hoping you can help me.
I just bought a new iPhone 5. I tried to sync it the way I always have, with all of my old iPhones but this one simply refuses to cooperate! I’m not getting an error message of any sort, but the sync does happen VERY quickly, as many others here have reported. I have not been able to sync apps, music, tones, or photos.
Most of my apps I finally uploaded from iCloud in the AppStore through my phone, but I still am not able to upload the bigger capacity ones.
When I try to sync with music selected, the bottom capacity bar, in iTunes, shows the blue portion for music at about half of my phone’s capacity, but the music doesn’t show up on my phone. Strangely enough, when I bought a new song through iTunes yesterday, it did show up on my phone via iCloud’s automatic download option.
I have old photos in my camera roll that do show up on my phone (that were on my previous phone), but none of the photos I choose in iTunes (even the events that were on my old phone) show up on my new phone. They do not show up in the capacity bar at the bottom of iTunes either. (Did that make sense?)
Tones are selected as well but do not show up in phone either, as previously mentioned.
I have tried everything on your list shy of reinstalling iTunes.
I have the latest software on both my iPhone and my MacBook Pro.
I have tried deselecting/selecting every option I can think of, both on my phone and on my Mac…even changing languages on my phone, as one website suggested.
Do you have any other suggests I may be able to try? This is driving me nuts! :)
Hi Rebecca, sorry for taking so long to get back to you. From what you say it sounds like you’ve tried almost everything out there to get your new iPhone to sync properly. For your circumstances, I do not think that uninstalling and reinstalling iTunes will do anything for you.
The most probable solution I can think of is to restore your iPhone though iTunes. You probably already know how to do this, however just incase, go the Summary Page of your iPhone in iTunes and click the “Restore iPhone” button. I actually had the same problem when I first bought my iPhone 4S, restoring it fixed it for me.
Thanks for your response, Damien. I had restored my phone twice before your response, but your response made me question my computer, rather than my phone. I realized that my computer was not updating the new iPhone software (although my phone had). That seemed to be causing the issue. When I restored for the third time, making sure that my computer had the updated software, it worked a bit better. This time it erased my favourite contacts, my wallpapers and all of my text messages but I can handle that. :) Thanks again!
I am beyond frustrated with Itunes I use to be a hard core apple supported as I love how my ipad/ipod/iphone/mac all synced together until recently. I FINALLY had a chance to upgrade to the newest itunes and downloaded new music and went to put it on my ipod. Well I plugged it in and it said it wasn’t recognized and needed restored. So I did that thinking it was because I hadn’t used it in a while as I had the Ipad but it was just recently stollen so back to ipod I went. Well I restored it and low and behold i resync it and it now says it finished syncing but the music will not sync. I have tried changing all the boxes to only checked songs and so forth. Nothing helps. It goes through the syncing process… it shows the blue part in the data that shows that it has music on it but as soon as the syncing is finished the blue disapears and there is no music on my ipod. I am beyond frustrated! help!?!?!
Hello Marissa, that does seem to be quite the frustrating predicament.
1. What options do you actually have selected under Summary page in iTunes right now?
2. Have you tried simply dragging your music onto your iPod? (select song, drag to the right, window will slide into view, drop the music on your iPod.
3. Does anything sync to your iPod or is it just the music that doesn’t sync?