Music App - Search error: "Something went wrong. Please try again later."

I've been having this problem on macOS Sonoma 14.7 as well, and it's been very frustrating since it's such a core feature of the app that you think must have been tested before release.

At any rate, searches on iTunes work, and then clicking on the red "Listen Now" button has been working for me to take me back to Apple Music. It's not great but at least that's another workaround. If you don't have iTunes in your sidebar or in your search options you may have to go to Preferences and click the checkbox to show iTunes.

It probably would be a good idea for everyone that has this problem to go to the Apple Feedback Website for Apple Music (or use Feedback Assistant if you have it) and file a feedback about this, so they are alerted to the severity and prevalence of this issue.

PROBLEM SOLVED !!!

I had the same problem. I am not able to upgrade to Sequoia yet, as I have 1-2 other apps which stilI require Sonoma 14.7. As others have discovered, I found that Apple Music searches on pre-Sequoia OS were failing on multi-word searches, but only on some, usually less popular artists or songs/albums.

I spent 2-3 hours with support, first on a support chat with a not very helpful person, then the case was escalated which resulted multiple call-backs, several of which were cut off mid call, and which involved me getting bounced to 2-3 different support offices.

Eventually I ended up with a very helpful support person, Maria, who patiently spent quite a lot of time testing with me. She was able to reproduce the same error on her macbook (also running 14.7). After a time, she agreed with my assessment that the problem was probably either in the app code itself, or in Apple's database that runs behind Apple music. She had me prepare and submit a screen recording demonstrating the problem, which I did, then promised a followup response in 3-4 days time.

Got a call-back from Maria today, and she confirmed that Apple engineering had made changes to the database code. I find the problem is now resolved, at least on my machine with my settings and OS.

So I urge anyone following this thread who previously had this problem to see if all's well for you now.

A quick check on the status page doesn't indicate any current issues with Apple Music.

That said, it happens sometimes that the Music app acts up.

Parts of it are essentially web pages that are being loaded within the app.

You've already tried signing out and signing back in as well as restarting your MacBook.

Only other thing that that comes to mind offhand is to make sure you don't have a firewall, VPN or other process that could affect your network connection in ways that might inadvertently block (parts of) the Apple Music service.

This could also be happening at the network level (e.g., modem, router, etc.) so if you do have another device on hand like an iPhone be sure to test if that one shows any issues as well while connected to the same network.

If all else fails and the issue persist then I suggest you reach out to support at https://getsupport.apple.com/topics

Click on "Show more" under Apps & Services and select Apple Music.

izai192 wrote:

wow. I thought this was something that started happening a few days ago, but as I keep scrolling, it seems like this has been going on for two weeks now or more. Glad I am not the only one. So what now?

Hopefully this gets resolved soon.

The only options we have as of now are:

1. Upgrade the entire OS to Sequoia (not recommended, unless you planned on upgrading anyway)
2. Use the Apple Music player on the Web
3. Restrict your searches in the desktop Apple Music app to single keywords
4. Use an unaffected device (iPad or iPhone, or a Mac running any other version of Apple Music besides Sonoma) to search, and then add the desired song to your library

Also, anyone who has not done so should add their voices in reporting this to Apple, which helps gives them an idea of the severity of the issue.

Feedback - Apple Music - Apple

I was experiencing this error on Sonoma 14.7 but, after updating to 14.7.1, which included Music 1.4.6.32, I am no longer getting this error.

Just use the web player (https://music.apple.com) til the issue is resolved.

I have the same problem on macOS 14.0 with Music v1.4.0.118.

Another fun thing is that the search works fine whenever I use up to 8 characters

I have this too, on Sonoma 14.7, Apple Music 1.4.6.32.

A workaround I have found is to log into Apple Music in a browser, do the search there, then add the album into my library. It is then available in Apple Music under Library/Recently Added.

YES! It took hours, but installing Sequoia 15.0.1 absolutely worked.

I'm now able to successfully search using multiple keywords on my MacBook.

Issue resolved.

This may well have been a server-side issue. The issue appears to be resolved as of October 26.

I can perform multiple keyword searches now without problems in Apple Music on Sonoma 14.7.

The MacRumors forum on which Apple Music issues are collectively gathered and reported also mentioned that this is not an issue for them, so I suspect it has been fixed on the Apple server side.

Thanks to everyone who reported this!

I've had the same issue today. Some testing has led me to conclude that I can search successfully if I only input a single word. As soon as it's multiple words, I get the error.

I'm not aware of any workarounds, other than hoping whatever you're looking for has a unique word in it.

I'm not sure if this will work for everyone, however I seem to have fixed my individual issue (Apple Music would not search for more than 1 word).

I created a new library with this article:

Use multiple libraries in Music on Mac - Apple Support

In that new Library I just created, the search worked as expected and this "Search Error" was not present.

From there, I also opened System Settings -> Screen Time -> Always Allowed

In that list, I toggled "On" both "Music" libraries listed.

I also confirmed that my "Content and Privacy" settings were "Off".

After that, I quit Apple Music, Ctrl + Clicked Open and "Choose Library" and selected my old Library.

From there, the search seemed to be working appropriately.

I'll come back with an update if it happens to give me the Search Error "Something went wrong. Please try again later" in the future.

-G

PROBLEM SOLVED !!!

I had the same problem. I am not able to upgrade to Sequoia yet, as I have 1-2 other apps which stilI require Sonoma 14.7. As others have discovered, I found that Apple Music searches on pre-Sequoia OS were failing on multi-word searches, but only on some, usually less popular artists or songs/albums.

I spent 2-3 hours with support, first on a support chat with a not very helpful person, then the case was escalated which resulted multiple call-backs, several of which were cut off mid call, and which involved me getting bounced to 2-3 different support offices.

Eventually I ended up with a very helpful support person, Maria, who patiently spent quite a lot of time testing with me. She was able to reproduce the same error on her macbook (also running 14.7). After a time, she agreed with my assessment that the problem was probably either in the app code itself, or in Apple's database that runs behind Apple music. She had me prepare and submit a screen recording demonstrating the problem, which I did, then promised a followup response in 3-4 days time.

Got a call-back from Maria today, and she confirmed that Apple engineering had made changes to the database code. I find the problem is now resolved, at least on my machine with my settings and OS.

So I urge anyone following this thread who previously had this problem to see if all's well for you now.

I updated to 14.7 yesterday without it resolving the issue and went through a few steps with tech support. Final succcessful resolution: UPDATE to Sequoia, and Apple Music is functioning again.

I am also having this issue. Just wanted to let anyone else affected that I have reported this issue up to Level 3 support at Apple and they're handing it off to the development team.

It does not appear to be account related as we did some testing, including using a fresh account on the same machine with the same issue. Appears to be specific to that version of Apple Music or MacOS. This is occurring for me on OS 14.7.

Same for me on macOS Sonoma 14.7 on an M1 MacBook Pro.

Happens in Safe Mode and only affects searches with multiple words (but not all multiple word searches).

For example, searching "the fly" works but "learn to fly" fails. Searching "the time" works but "what time is it" fails.

I've been asked to reinstall macOS and if that fails it might be escalated to the senior team. I'm not doing that right now as it's affecting multiple users.

This does not affect macOS Ventura as I have a MacBook Air M2 on 13.5.1 and that's working.