Apple Music issues after iOS 18 Update

I’m sorry I updated to iOS 18. I only updated because my AirPods 4 wouldn’t show up in “Find My” until I updated all my devices.

After the iOS 18 update, I’m having issues with Apple Music: songs fade out halfway through or they stutter; I cannot update playlists and the app freezes. It is very frustrating. I understand there are problems when there’s an update, but Apple has received enough complaints to do something to fix the problems they created.

The issue I am having with iTunes is some of my purchased music and songs are no longer available and some I can’t play because it’s not authorized. Didn’t have any issues like this with ios17. Spoke with tech support for three hours on Saturday to no avail. I am getting a call back on Wednesday.

I haven’t had issues with audio quality, but I have had issues with music disappearing and not being playable. For example, I had an entire album downloaded to my phone and songs 3-6 are just gone now. The only way I can play them is through apple music, not my library. I have also had it being funky with the queue.

Today is the first time I play music after iOS 18 update and my compilation albums now are sorted by artist instead of by song title as it used to be. There is no way I can change the sorting back and playback stops randomly, so I have to restart the app to continue playing.

The reason I have compilation albums is to avoid listening to the same artist back to back and I am not a fan of shuffle play, as I have memorized the order of my songs and they need to remain in the same order. I have to stop mid-workout routine and turn off the music. Apple must fix this nonsense.

I’ve also noticed that sometimes I can’t skip a song, or fast forward through a song by dragging on the time bar or by keeping the fast forward symbol pressed. I try but the song just goes back to where it was up to, which is a pain when it’s a 25 minute song by Yes or Pink Floyd which starts off great but then gets a bit monotonous.

Just wondering what those of you saying you can't sync are using? I can sync ok using iTunes on a Windows 11 laptop. I have to connect via a cable, they won't talk to each other via wifi (since pre iOS 18, I think it's a Windows 11 issue) because the replacements for iTunes (Apple Music and Apple Devices) were a waste of space, wiped all the music off my phone, wouldn't put it back on, froze, only seemed to want to copy music held on the Cloud (I think that's what it was hinting at?) and so on.

I just started using Apple Music, coming from Spotify (trying the Apple One subscription) and I am having all these issues. I never used it before iOS18 or Sequoia so i'm not sure how much worse it has become. I cannot get favourited albums to sync between phone and macbook, they randomly disappear or some i can't even add. Some albums have songs missing entirely. I can add an album to favourites on the macbook and watch it appear on my phone in real time but then it disappears later. Albums I add on the phone never make it to the macbook. I wanted a break from all the bloat of Spotify (podcasts, audiobooks etc) and just use an app for music (with bonus lossless audio) but man this basic stuff is just painful!

I contacted Apple support, and they advised me to reset all settings, which I did. Unfortunately, the issue still persists as you described. We're definitely losing our subscription money due to a problem we've never encountered before. I hope they release an update to fix this soon. I encourage everyone to reach out to Apple support and report any issues as they arise; this will help prioritize their fixing efforts.

Okay songs and playlist are, knock on wood, presently working… but opening music back up this morning, all album and playlist art seems to have disappeared

EDIT: correction: tracks from the iTunes Store/Apple Music appear to have retained theirs, but art for tracks sourced from other sources like my own CD collection are gone at the moment.

Hahaha your last sentence describes my mental state when dealing with this incredible song download and playlist adds lag perfectly! I spoke with tech support on Sat (09/28) and they said they aren't aware of any Music app issues since ios18 and I was like, "Check out this thread I have been commenting on and following then; it's a huge problem!"

Just updated to iOS 18.0.1 thinking all the Music app problems everyone and myself

have been experiencing since updating to 18 (huge download lag times, playlist

add timeouts, playing/forwarded songs taking forever) would solve all our

issues, and it didn't fix anything!!! What is going on?!

Just

updated to iOS 18.0.1 thinking all the Music app problems everyone and myself

have been experiencing since updating to 18 (huge download lag times, playlist

add timeouts, playing/forwarded songs taking forever) would solve all our

issues, and it didn't fix anything!!! What is going on?!

Yes, the apple music app has been extremely slow and laggy since updating to ios 18, today’s 18.0.1 update still did not fix the issue. I have been using the Jet Music Player (I purchased it to use fyi) instead and it seems to work without any lagging or freezing like the music app player. Hope apple can patch or fix this in the 18.1 update.