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Syncing Apple Music across devices

Hi everyone.


I've been using Apple Music on my iPhone and added lots of songs and playlists. I would like these to show up in Apple Music on my Mac also.


  1. Do I need to check the sync library box in the apple music preferences on my Mac for this to happen?
  2. It says that the music on my Mac will appear on other devices once I enable sync, but I have loads of music on my Mac from over the years. Does this mean all of that music will be uploaded to iCloud and synced to my iphone? If so, I don't want that to happen. Is there a way I can just have the songs and playlists from my phone appear in Apple Music on my Mac?


Thanks.

Posted on Jan 15, 2022 1:34 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jan 17, 2022 3:50 AM

With Apple Music content from your library is either matched or uploaded. Where items are matched you will use the iTunes Store version of the track on another device. If the track is uploaded then your exact version is used everywhere, although the audio format may sometimes be modified. See Identify cloud status icons in your music library on your Mac or PC - Apple Support. When your library and your device both have Sync Library/iCloud Music Library enabled changes you make to playlists and metadata in one computer or device should sync to your others automatically over the air.


tt2

10 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jan 17, 2022 3:50 AM in response to amd1

With Apple Music content from your library is either matched or uploaded. Where items are matched you will use the iTunes Store version of the track on another device. If the track is uploaded then your exact version is used everywhere, although the audio format may sometimes be modified. See Identify cloud status icons in your music library on your Mac or PC - Apple Support. When your library and your device both have Sync Library/iCloud Music Library enabled changes you make to playlists and metadata in one computer or device should sync to your others automatically over the air.


tt2

Jan 16, 2022 1:23 PM in response to amd1

Hello amd1,


Welcome to Apple Support Communities!


We understand you'd like to sync playlists from your iPhone to your Mac. We'll be glad to assist.


You can Turn on Sync Library with Apple Music to access your music on all your devices. This will help move the music on your Mac to your iPhone and iPhone to your Mac.


If you have a lot of music it will take some time to match it with the Apple Music catalog. If you prefer not to complete this step, there isn't a way to manually sync the music to your Mac. You'll need to create the same playlist on your Mac: Create, edit and delete playlists in Music on Mac


Take care.

Jan 17, 2022 5:38 AM in response to amd1

If you had started from scratch there would have been no local music or purchase history, so your iCloud Music Library would only have had the content that you added from Apple Music. It would have been possible to create a separate library before enabling Sync Library/iCloud Music Library, which would have had the default playlists and your purchase history. Unwanted lists can be deleted and purchases hidden. Apple clearly assume that if you're talking out a subscription to their Apple Music or iTunes Match services you're going to want your existing content and playlists to be included.


While you cannot stop Apple Music matching/uploading content you add to the local library, if you really don't want it to appear elsewhere you can open a second library or use your iPhone to remove it from your cloud library. Then in the original library the tracks will be marked as removed (see Identify cloud status icons in your music library on your Mac or PC - Apple Support again) and can play there, but don't go back into the cloud unless you right-click and use add to cloud library to match/upload them again.


tt2

Jan 17, 2022 4:31 AM in response to turingtest2

I'm not sure about that. For example, all my Spotify songs and playlists are sync'd from phone to Mac and vice versa, but it doesn't try to match or upload any of the music stored locally on my Mac, which is exactly how I want it. If I want, I can add music to my phone from my Mac manually and play it using Spotify. I much prefer having that option and I don't understand why it isn't an option with Apple music.

Jan 17, 2022 5:18 AM in response to amd1

Spotify, involves streaming songs from their servers, or listening to downloaded (DRM protected) copies of the somgs from their servers. That is all.

Apple Music, when locally stored files not bought from the iTunes store are imported, matches them with copies on Apple’s server for legal reasons I suspect, and then synchronises those. In addition, Apple Music can do streaming.

Syncing Apple Music across devices

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