If you have music that won't play on your device

If you have music that won't play on your device you might see something like this when viewing the device in iTunes or Finder, where some tracks are greyed out and have small dotted circles against them

or you may have greyed out tracks in Music on the device and get a pop-up like this with the text This song is not currently available in your country or region when you try to play them

In both cases it appears something has gone wrong with the sync process and the device has incomplete or corrupt copies of the files on it. No amount of repeat syncing will fix things once they have gone wrong. Changing your sync selections won't necessarily remove these broken items either. The solution is to remove the relevant entries from the device, either piecemeal or by removing all music from the device, then sync fresh copies of the tracks from your library.

To remove music from the device go to Settings > General > Device Storage > Music > Edit. From there you can either select All Songs or individual artists to delete. Once you've finished removing entries from the device you should be able to successfully add items from your library.

If the method above has not worked for you then a more comprehensive approach is to backup your device, restore as a new device, then restore your backup. All of your media that you want to restore to your device must be in your library before you try this. You should ideally backup your device to both your computer and iCloud in case one of the backups doesn't work when you try to restore it.

Using the Apple Music & iTunes Match subscription services

If you have either of these services you should turn on Sync Library or iCloud Music Library in both computer and device. On the computer that holds your library use the Songs view with the iCloud Status column enabled to review your library and try to make sure that you don't have any items with an iCloud Status of Waiting or Error. If you do you may be able to select these items, right-click, and use Add to library, to encourage these to be added to your cloud library. Once matched or uploaded these should appear on all your devices where Sync Library is enabled.

Authorization issues in the library

If you have tracks that won't play in your library, or won't transfer to a device, complaining that your computer needs to be authorized, and yet reauthorizing the computer doesn't fix anything, then you are perhaps looking at purchased tracks that haven't been decrypted properly after download. Assuming these are purchases, and you have backups, try right-clicking and removing the download, or deleting from the library without hiding from your purchase history, then redownload from the cloud links that should remain in the library. In some cases you may need to close and reopen before they show. While redownloading it may help to click the activity widget and turn off the option that allows for simultaneous downloads.

Support Articles

• Backup methods for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch - Apple Support
• If songs are missing from your music library after you turn on Sync Library - Apple Support
• Transfer files or sync content between your iPhone and computer with the Finder or iTunes - Apple Support