Where exactly are music files stored?

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Level 1

23 points

Where exactly are music files stored?

Apparently the conversion from the iTunes.app to the Music.app didn't go very smooth on my system.

I ended up with two sets of music:

User/Home/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music/Music and User/Home/Music/Music/Media/Music

I reset the location in the Music.app which gave me User/Home/Music/Music/Media but I'm still unsure if the music files themselves are in the Media folder or in another nested Music folder. Adding to the confusion, in the Media folder there are three folders (Music, Automatically Add to Music, Downloads-Music) and a file, Music Library.musiclibrary. Any help as to what goes where would be much appreciated.

MacBook Pro 15″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Aug 23, 2020 3:02 PM

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Answer 1

waybacmac Author

Level 1

23 points

Aug 25, 2020 12:03 PM in response to waybacmac

I appreciate your answer but what I was clumsily looking for was the actual default location, like on a brand new installation. My current location (User/Home/Music/Music/Media/Music) looks like one or two "/Music" too many. Thanks anyway.

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Answer 2

ed2345

Level 9

62,486 points

Aug 23, 2020 6:14 PM in response to waybacmac

Depending how you have built your library, the music files might be in multiple places. To find the file for a specific track, right-click the track in the library and choose Show in Finder.

If you really want to get them all into one place, you can use the Consolidate command.

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Answer 3

ed2345

Level 9

62,486 points

Aug 25, 2020 2:38 PM in response to waybacmac

Waybacmac,

That kind of does look like one "Music" too many, but that does not hurt anything. For information about the default, and how to change it, see in here:

Change where your music files are stored on Mac - Apple Support

That document also describes the previously-mentioned Consolidate command in case you do want to put them all in one place.

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Where exactly are music files stored?

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