iCloud For windows 11 does not sync and appears to stall at log in

After hours of trying to get iCloud to complete the sync of Files, Photos, and Passwords, etc. I was able to figure out the root cause with some assistance from Apple Support.


YOU MUST SIGN IN WITH YOUR ORIGINAL APPLEID!


Scenario:

After installing iCloud for windows and completing initial login and setup, the application seems to get stuck. No sync will happen and quite frequently it will hang on the login screen when you reboot after the initial setup. This was especially hard to troubleshoot because the application throws no errors so it is difficult to know what to chase down.


Root cause:

I typically use my iCloud email address whenever I log into apple services and that normally always works, but for some reason the iCloud sync will not work if that email address is not the original AppleID. My original AppleID is an "@gmail.com" address. Once I logged into the iCloud for Windows app with my original AppleID, the application lit up and started working.


I would suggest that Apple Engineering account for this flaw somehow and either fix the login issue or create an error message stating the original AppleID must be used to log in.


Shout out the two individuals that assisted from Apple Support.


Posted on Dec 10, 2024 3:06 PM

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Posted on Jan 3, 2025 10:56 PM

Thanks for the Help. Apple really needs to fix this ID problem. They must have changed something because it worked before with icloud and just stopped working out of the blue.

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Jan 10, 2025 2:02 PM in response to littjd

Hi - thanks for this solution - it actually works. I have an iCloud account that was created from a legacy [user]@mac.com account. During the transition of services at apple this became a [user]@me.com account. I had been trying to sign in with the [user]@me.com version of the account name. Even though this appeared to work and iCloud for Windows displayed my real name and even the legacy mac.com username it never achieved sync with iCloud. Resetting iCloud for windows and signing in with the older mac.com username worked for me.

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Feb 22, 2025 9:28 PM in response to littjd

Unfortunately this did not work for me. Everything Randomly stopped syncing because... ya know, apple just works right??

changed my primary email to all 3 different emails i have on my account and none of them work when signing into them, icloud just hangs when trying to sync anything and icloud drive wont even turn on.

so now I dont have icloud on my pc. Thanks apple!

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Jan 1, 2025 8:16 AM in response to littjd

My friend, you just save my life...

I installed and uninstalled a few times the app, looked at the firewall config, host files, asked to the Apple Store in my country, etc....

Finally, I am back with my iCloud Drive sync!


Thanks a lot!

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Jan 29, 2025 3:40 PM in response to littjd

I do not understand. How can you have two different email addresses associated with getting to your iCloud information?


I only remember using one email address. Using that information, I still cannot get iCloud for windows on Windows 11 to work.


What other solutions might I pursue?

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Jan 4, 2025 10:26 PM in response to littjd

Hi guys, happy 2025! So I' have this same problem and I've tried all this entire tips and tricks trying to solve it without any success. As reported on icloud drive do not sync on win 11 - Apple Community, and Im a subcriber of the cloud+ 6TB, so I tried to run too on new pcs with fresh win11 and got the same bug.

at this time I'm using my Iphone to compress every folder of my lot of works and using the web version of Icloud Drive to download every the zip files to another in a Dropbox folder at win 11 pc - just sadly migrating all my stuff.

As a Brazilian with portuguese/latin language, I saw when the folders are umcompressed, a CHARSET MISTYPE On files and folders names when it originally has an latin characters, like a bug when you use windows files inside linux/bsd/unix files without conversion. I think that maybe one of the root of these bugs on this new version of Icloud drive software and ecosystem too.

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Jan 24, 2025 7:29 AM in response to littjd

Not necessarily correct, my original icloud was a @gmail and I changed that to @icloud for continuity.


That said, I have icloud on a Win10 pc and Win11 laptop; password syncing stopped working between my 3 devices (iPhone). Uninstalled, rebooted, and reinstalled was unable to enable Passwords and Keychain. Sometimes the icloud app would simply open as an endless logging in loop.


  • I closed the icloud app window and re-opened icloud from taskbar (by the clock and double-click icon). Went to account details and sign out.
  • MAKE SURE to disable VPN -- logging into icloud and authenticating password feature MUST be on the same network between your iphone and PC/laptop -- mine is activated on the cell phone.
  • MAKE SURE to disable cellular or go into airplane mode and turn Wi-Fi back on.

Log back into icloud, then click password, then log in icloud again (will be reprompted) and then authenticate.

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Feb 4, 2025 4:27 PM in response to littjd

Thank you for this! It sparked a thought, and sure enough, here's an alternative that worked for me:

  1. Open the Settings App on your ios device.
  2. Open Apple Account options (first selection)
  3. Open "Sign-In & Security"
  4. Under "Email and Phone Numbers," set the email address you typically use to sign into iCloud (i.e. @icloud.com, @me.com, etc.) as your "Primary email"
  5. On iCloud for Windows, be sure to login using what you set as your "Primary email."
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Jan 14, 2025 8:10 AM in response to littjd

I signed in for the first time just to reply. THANK YOU!!! I searched for a solution for weeks. No recommendation was helping. I was devastated, had nearly giving up and then stumbled over your post. My ID is also xx@mac.com, which I never use to sign in. But now everything works as intended.

What a relief. Thanks again mate for taking the time and posting the solution to your (our) problem.

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Feb 22, 2025 11:06 PM in response to james shamy

What Ended up fixing it for me was a suggestion on a windows forum from a couple years ago.

I had to do an in place upgrade on windows, essentially reinstalling windows without losing data.

now everything is updating again! I think I'll blame this one on windows, I think the update screwed something up.


Icloud drive not enabled - Microsoft Community


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Feb 23, 2025 6:32 AM in response to james shamy

All the recommendations regarding icloud user-ids / mail addresses don't help me. I always used my @gmx.de mail adress and it worked always. Now as I have switched to Windows 11 sync does not work any longer. @gmx.de is my primary mail address. I use it also to log into icloud drive. It works on icloud.com and I can start the icloud on windows app. However, syncronisation is only "initialised". Are there any other ideas??? Thanks!


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Feb 26, 2025 9:49 AM in response to littjd

None of these fixes work for me. It works fine on my Asus desktop does not work on my Asus Rog. And I even completely wiped the rogue and started over from scratch same problem so I’m now I’m starting to think it’s an incompatibility with the rogue and iCloud because it works fine on my desktop same email address.

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iCloud For windows 11 does not sync and appears to stall at log in

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