Playlists on iTunes

Hi, Arthur,

Thanks for dropping by the Apple Support Communities. It looks like you're having some trouble managing music on your new iPhone 7 using iTunes. I'm happy to help!

When you connect your iPhone to iTunes, you will see all of the playlists and content on that phone under the Device heading in the iTunes sidebar. So what you're seeing there is correct, and should be there.

When you sync your iPhone with iTunes, it takes music from the computer and syncs it to the phone, but not the other way around. That means if you create playlists on the phone, they won't sync back to the computer when you sync. If you have iTunes Match or Apple Music and are using iCloud Music Library, your content will sync back and forth between all devices you're using with it: Turn on iCloud Music Library with Apple Music - Apple Support.

Additionally, you can only sync your iPhone with one iTunes library at a time. It is expected that syncing with a new iTunes library will remove what music is currently on the iPhone and replace it with the music that is in iTunes on the computer. If you have the same songs in this iTunes library, you won't lose any music. However if there are songs on your iPhone from a different library that are not in the one you're trying to sync with, they will be removed.

Check out the Apple Support article Sync your iPhone, iPad, or iPod using iTunes on your computer - Apple Support for more information on syncing.

Based on that information, the only thing that seems like it's not working as expected is that playlists created in iTunes are not syncing to your iPhone when you sync. To solve this, I suggest the following:

1. Check for and install any updates for iTunes: Update to the latest version of iTunes - Apple Support, your Windows PC: How to keep your Windows computer up-to-date, and your iPhone: Update your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch - Apple Support.
2. Close iTunes and restart your computer, then reopen iTunes and try to sync again.
3. Use the steps in Sync your iPhone, iPad, or iPod using iTunes on your computer - Apple Support to find the music sync options. Turn it off by unchecking the music sync box, then selecting Apply. Then turn it back on and click Apply again. This will remove all music and other content that you synced from the phone, then re-add what's on the computer to the phone.

Happy listening!

See Recover your iTunes library from your iPod or iOS device - Apple Community. Once all of your media content and playlists are in your local library you can afford to remove and sync as shown.

tt2