Cloud music library update stuck - new imported music won't sync all of a sudden

I've been experiencing the exact same issues for weeks. While the vast majority of my 28,600 songs upload, I add a few new songs to my library and it just hangs and pinwheels for hours on end. Some files will eventually appear (after days) and be playable across devices, some won't. What's also curious is some of my playlists are showing as duplicates as well as some random songs. There doesn't seem to be anyway to troubleshoot or nail down a pattern apart from syncing and re-syncing, but nothing works. I thought it may have been a corrupt file somewhere, but clearly it's not given the amount of people discussing this here.

I am a Match subscriber and an Apple Music subscriber and have been since the beginning for both. Just over 25,000 songs (all properly uploaded or matched prior to this debacle).

Exactly one week ago I did a test to add just one single new song to my library. As of this time it is STILL "Waiting" and has yet to either upload or match.  Prior to this one test (before I knew of the issue) I had tried to add 18 songs and after a day of trying to match it uploaded 2 of them and all the rest were still just waiting.

This issue isn't limited to a certain OS or version. It is infuriating that Apple is refusing to acknowledge this is an issue and fix it.

Yes. I have this problem with Music 1.0.6.10 running in macOS 10.15.7 (Catalina).

FWIW, there's another much more active discussion of this problem here:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/252968057?login=true&page=16

This shows that this problem occurs with any hardware/OS/software combination capable of being used with the iTunes Match service (i.e., Mac or Windows) and regardless of whether the service comes as a standalone subscription or as part of a subscription to Apple Music.

The issue is now attracting attention on sites such as MacRumors and 9 to 5 Mac. We can only hope that this will help ensure i gets more traction with those in charge at Apple because, so far there has been no official acknowledgement that they are even aware of the problem.

Same problem here on a brand new MacBook Pro uploading from the local SSD. Restarted, deauthorized and reauthorized, restarted both Music (several times) and the MacBook (multiple times), speed tested my network connection and nothing seems out of order.

Started the sync process manually from the menu (File -> Library -> Update Cloud Library) and it gets as far as "Matching your music with songs in the iTunes Store", then red rings just before it finishes and stalls out. So far it's matched 6 of 25 songs (2 albums) despite being left running for almost the entire day.

Seems there are a few hundred reports of this between this thread and another one, with several cases opened with Apple to -- so far -- no avail. Technically the servers are running (as evidenced by the success of the small number of songs that have successfully uploaded).

I'm only guessing of course, but I would assume that the metadata is stored separately with a link to the actual media, that resides in its own space. I further suspect that if a track is available in the iTunes Store, they don't actually upload your digital content, but use the version they already have. But for tracks not carried in the iTunes Store, there would be a data center (or more likely data centers) dedicated to unmatched contact. These would show up as "Uploaded" rather than "Matched" in the Cloud Status column of Apple Music.

The new-ish "lossless" enhancement may be gumming things up, possibly because not every track in the world has a "lossless" version available to match. But there should be a fallback to a compressed version in those cases.

You're not alone. From what I see, it seems the problems we've been experiencing over the last three weeks or so have been resolved. I just checked on 170 tracks that were still stuck as "Waiting" a few hours ago and see they are now all showing as "Matched".

My uploads for iTunes Match are also taking ages but one reason could be when artist names or album name vary eg one song by Crosby, Still & Nash is 'stuck' because Apple has the artists as Stills & Nash Crosby. Here are a few more:

I'm interested in seeing if these get resolved as the upload progresses!

I am having the exact same problem only mine is on a PC.

I just left mine running over night and it eventually got everything caught up but it really should have been much quicker as I was only adding a couple of songs.

Still very slow about uploading new songs. I added two songs today and had to let it sit for a couple hours before it completed. I do not have a huge library of song (7000) and very good fiber internet service.

I am still not having much luck with this uploading to icloud problem. I added one song and it would not upload or match with the itunes library. I waited over 24 hours. On my itunes it shows as a downloaded music file, but it still has the faded cloud picture and it will not allow me to add to a playlist. I tried a little experiment. I usually convert my songs to ACC version in itunes before sending to the cloud. I decided to delete the music file I had on the computer and reinstall the song into itunes. This time I left it in the .mp3 format. Sent it to the cloud and it went pretty quickly. So, decided to do the conversion on it to ACC version and it again is stuck trying to send to the cloud. Hmmm. Anyone have any thoughts?

Exact same problem yesterday and today. I usually add songs every Monday. Had no problem until yesterday. Thought it might be better today, but it still gets stuck close to the end of “matching your songs in the iTunes Store”

Same exact problem here. I ripped 22 cd's and I see them just fine in my itunes library and on the recently added section on my phone. When I click on the album cover to list the songs all, some or none of the songs are grayed out for each of the albums. I have tried every trick in the book to get these songs to sync to my phone with no luck. Going on three weeks now with no change.

I have had the same problem for 10 days now. ITunes Match doesn’t work on a Mac or a PC. Both have up to date software. Customer Support didn’t escalate when I called. They just told me to call Microsoft for help since I had problems on iTunes on Windows 10. Frustrating.