iOS 13 Music App album art is incorrect.

This appears to be fixed for me now. Change appears to be having upgraded my Macbook to Catalina, because nothing has worked since this started with the rollout of iOS 13

1. Upgraded Macbook Pro to macOS Catalina 10.15 last evening
2. Iphone is at 13.1.2

I removed all the music from my phone, rebooted, reconnected and resynched all of my playlists this morning. Playlist artwork on the iPhone is good now. After repeatedly scrolling up and down the playlists, the correct album cover(s) are showing by the applicable playlist.

I don't have a Windows machine so I cannot test anything in that environment.

thanks-

Hi all,

I'm not sure if the following has already been discussed, but here's a solution that works for me. It's somewhat time-consuming, especially if you have thousands of files in your iTunes library. As an indicator, I have around 4,000 files and the following takes about 45 minutes to complete. :-(

Before you begin, understand that your iPhone's music library will be erased if you proceed. So please take this precaution: ensure that the iTunes library on your computer contains everything you want on your phone: songs, playlists and cover art.

1. Disconnect your iPhone from your computer
2. On your computer, open iTunes
3. Navigate to: iTunes > Edit > Preferences > Advanced
4. Ensure Keep iTunes Media folder organised is deselected
5. OK
6. iTunes > Edit > Preferences > Advanced
7. Ensure that Keep iTunes Media folder organised is selected
8. OK.

This forces iTunes to re-read its library and rebuild links between files and their metadata.

1. Connect your iPhone to your computer via the cable
2. Click the phone's icon, found immediately beneath the iTunes menu bar

** WARNING: HERE COMES THE RISKY AND TIME-CONSUMING PART **

1. In the left panel: Settings > Music
2. In the right panel: ensure that Entire music library is selected > deselect Sync Music
3. Accept the warning, then click Sync. Your phone's music library will now be ERASED. Wait until this process is complete before proceeding.
4. In the right panel: select Sync Music > apply. Your library will now be transferred from your computer to your iPhone, including cover art and playlists.
5. Allow this process to complete, then confirm that your phone's music library looks as you'd expect.

You might be thinking, "Why do I have to blow away my phone's entire music library? Can't I just do a differential sync, and the errors that were corrected when iTunes re-read its library will be fixed on phone too?". I thought the same thing... but, sadly, it didn't work. Only a complete wipe/restore of the phone's library worked for me.

In case you're wondering, here's what caused my iPhone's cover art to go screwy in the first place:

1. My phone was disconnected from the computer
2. In iTunes I selected a playlist > clicked its cover art > selected a new JPG image when prompted
3. I connected the phone to the computer via cable
4. I initiated a library sync in iTunes.

Once the sync was complete I checked the playlists on the phone: the recently-tweaked playlist was showing the wrong cover art, as were several other items. Lesson learned: if changing a playlist's cover art, do it on the phone, not in iTunes.

Kind regards,

Jason Paris

EltonOutOfTheCloset.com

Hi all,

I've just had reason to repair my iPhone's music library yet again... and my previous solution didn't work! :-( I rearranged the steps and had another try; this time it worked. So, if my previous solution doesn't work for you, please try the following.

Before you begin, understand that your iPhone's music library will be erased if you proceed. So please take this precaution: ensure that the iTunes library on your computer contains everything you want on your phone: songs, playlists and cover art.

1. Connect your iPhone to your computer via the cable
2. Open iTunes on your computer
3. In iTunes, click the phone icon, found immediately beneath the iTunes menu bar.

** WARNING: HERE COMES THE RISKY PART **

1. In the left panel: Settings > Music
2. In the right panel: ensure that Entire music library is selected > deselect Sync Music
3. Accept the warning, then click Sync. Your phone's music library will now be ERASED. Wait until this process is complete before proceeding.

1. Navigate to: iTunes > Edit > Preferences > Advanced
2. Ensure Keep iTunes Media folder organised is deselected
3. OK
4. iTunes > Edit > Preferences > Advanced
5. Ensure that Keep iTunes Media folder organised is selected
6. OK.

This forces iTunes to re-read its library and rebuild links between files and their metadata.

** WARNING: HERE COMES THE TIME-CONSUMING PART

[approximately 1 minute for every 100 files in your library] **

1. In iTunes, click the phone icon, found immediately beneath the iTunes menu bar
2. In the left panel: Settings > Music
3. In the right panel: select Sync Music > Apply. Your library will now be transferred from your computer to your iPhone, including cover art and playlists.
4. Allow this long process to complete, then confirm that your phone's music library looks as you'd expect.

Kind regards,

Jason Paris

EltonOutOfTheCloset.com

Hi all,

I thought it'd be helpful to summarise my previous messages, and make it easier for everyone grappling with this issue.

The Underlying Problem

From what I can tell, the issue is caused because the iTunes GUI does not automatically write metadata changes back to its underlying files. For example, if you're in iTunes on your computer and change the artwork for an album, you'll see the change in the GUI. But the change won't necessarily be reflected in the underlying files. So when you sync with your iPhone, the artwork for this album (and other items) is likely to be wrong.

To Prevent The Problem

After each and every change in the iTunes GUI - and immediately before syncing - do the following:

1. iTunes > Edit > Preferences > Advanced
2. Keep iTunes Media folder organised: DESELECT
3. OK
4. iTunes > Edit > Preferences > Advanced
5. Keep iTunes Media folder organised: SELECT
6. OK
7. Wait for this (short) process to complete, then begin the sync.

This manually forces the iTunes GUI to write your metadata changes to the underlying files.

To Fix The Problem

If your cover art has already become screwy on your iPhone, the following will fix it. But please note: this process is lengthy (approximately 90 seconds for every 100 files in your library), and will erase the entire music library from your iPhone. Before continuing, please ensure that your computer's iTunes' library has everything you want in your phone's Music app.

1. With the cable, connect your phone and computer
2. Open iTunes on your computer. If it opened automatically and started a sync, cancel it.
3. In iTunes, select your iPhone (the icon immediately below the menu bar)
4. In the left pane: Settings > Music
5. In the right pane: ensure Entire Music Library is selected
6. Deselect Sync Music > respond to the warning > Sync

Your iPhone's music library will now be erased; please wait until this process finishes.

1. iTunes > Edit > Preferences > Advanced
2. Keep iTunes Media folder organised: DESELECT
3. OK
4. iTunes > Edit > Preferences > Advanced
5. Keep iTunes Media folder organised: SELECT
6. OK
7. Wait for this (short) process to complete.

The iTunes GUI and its underlying files are now synchronised. Now, let's transfer the entire music library to your iPhone (this is the time-consuming part!):

1. In iTunes, select your iPhone (the icon immediately below the menu bar)
2. In the left pane: Settings > Music
3. In the right pane: select Sync Music > Apply.

Allow the sync to complete. Then, check the Music app on your iPhone and confirm that everything looks as it should.

I'd love to know if this work for you or not. :-)

Kind regards,

Jason Paris

EltonOutOfTheCloset.com

…Re previous post 22 Sept, 9:39: Figs of ‘listed’ and ‘sublisted’ thumbnail artworks below. PS: Recently Played list should have always had photos or thumbnails, but hasn’t ever as recalled; and it’s format probably is associated with current bug needing fixed or an alternative—no default photo ‘summary’ of contents. Please fix or alternate.

Yeah I’m definitely having a problem since updating to ios13 as well.

I’ve noticed that my playlist icons will display correctly at first

but then when I scroll further down then back up the icons are all different...

iPhone 8 / iOS 13

I wonder if this is related to the Apple Music library indexing or why it is being ignored. But some of the mix up if it wasn’t so annoying would almost be comical. Except I paid for a product and they have had a failure to protect my investment.

I found a workaround that did the trick for me. Assign each playlist it's own image. Tap the playlist image and replace with an image of your choice. I used album covers I found on Google Images. I changed the playlist images on Itunes in my computer, synced with my phone, and no more incorrect, shifting images.

Re iPhone 7 Music app’s Playlists’ listed thumbnail artwork, same problem; new Playlist made in iOS 13 fails syncing with current v of iTunes on Windows 10 desktop too. Hopefully new update v today or tomorrow fixes bugs at least if fix is not available now.

I have iPhone SE with iOS 13, and ITunes on Windows 10, but I create/edit playlists in ITunes, then sync my phone. Changing the playlist thumbnail in ITunes on the PC, then syncing fixed the problem for me. However, before syncing, I noticed that the playlists in my phone had the option to upload a different thumbnail by tapping the existing thumbnail, so that's probably another thing to try. As you mentioned, a bug fix will probably take care of the whole issue on the 24th.

I'm experiencing the same issue. I'm so glad I've found this thread as I've discussed this with Apple Support on Twitter and it felt like I was the only one!

At first, I thought it only took place during a sync with iTunes but the playlist art alters randomly, always 'choosing' art from some other existing playlist. It can even change if I close the app and reopen. This happens in 'Recently Added' and the list under 'Playlists' but is always the correct artwork when I go to any album and album tracks itself.

It's true that selecting album art from another source (eg, a photo of the album cover from elsewhere) and changing it to that under 'edit' does fix the problem for that playlist but I find the four album cover artwork useful for identifying compilations and it's not so easy to create those.

If I do look at the app's library whilst syncing with iTunes, I can see the various album's artwork changing back and forth. Here's hoping for a fix in iOS 13.1.

I have an iPhone 11 with the latested update 13.1 and had the same problem everbody is talking about. What I did is connect to iTunes on Windows 10 and select the phone icon and under the settings section on the left side select music and make sure the check box next to Entire music library is selected and hit sync. It resynced all of my songs with the correct album, playlist and song art.

I am in trouble with the same situation. And did not fixed on iOS 13.1.

I found the same issue reported in the beta version. This means that it was not fixed by the release version.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/ios-13-beta-5-%E2%80%95-bug-fixes-changes-and-improvements.2191695/

I want it to be fixed in the next version.

Sadly it looks like they might be canning the single most important app in the Apple Universe. I read somewhere that they are just going to have a MUSIC app. If i cannot have my playlists and album art for each song in my playlists perfect my main reason for using an iPhone all my life starts to disappear. Just hope whatever they do takes cognizance of the fact that our music libraries remain our most valued things on our computers. We need the ability to use parts of these with precision on our mobile devices. Amen !

Have seen people mention Windows 10 and iTunes. Is this also happening with Mac versions of iTunes as well? In my case, Win 10, iPhone 8. Seeing the same 10 or so covers stretch across all my playlists (a hundred or so) in a repeating pattern.