Why aren't PDFs from iTunes not syncing to iBooks on iOS 6?

I notice that if I go to the itunes > iphone > books page that my pdf's don't show up for selection. But, once I click the itunes sync button they mysteriously all appear and I can check and uncheck which ones I want and then click apply to have them included in that sync.

Here is my solution for two issues that have been showing in discussion groups.

Books tab not showing

Seems like if you do not have a book in your computer the tab doesn't show.

Solution:

go to iTunes > Preferences > General Tab and make sure the Books box is checked.

On the left bar, select Library > Books Click on Books in the iTunes Store

Search for a previously purchased book and download it again.

Cant sync books on the devices to computer

Connect your device to the computer open itunes

right click on the device icon

select transfer purchases

after all purchases are transferedlyou should be able to transfer normally.

Hope this helps.

Vidor

what i did was open up itunes. Go to libary where you can select music movies and that and go to your book libary. Select pdf files and you will se your pdf libary and then search for the pdf file and drag it from finder to the pdf libary and it will be added. and then it's just to sync with your Ipad/Iphone and se the magic.

It worked for me 🙂

Edit: Sorry i did not se that this answer already was added. sorry

Wow, so glad you wrote this. I've been trying for days to get some PDFs over to my iPad and it just won't sync with iTunes. I knew there was another way and could not think of it. The e-mail tactic worked immediately. I use these files on stage so without the iPad I would have been back to the stone age; paper or somehow with a laptop strapped to a microphone stand. Thanks for posting that useful tip. I hope Apple Support stick it in a prominent place somewhere.

Like everyone else, I tried multiple ways to synch a pdf to my iBooks app on my iPhone, and could not find the pdf. So I assumed this was a synching problem. After reading about this issue in multiple forums and then playing with my iBooks app for awhile I found the solution. The pdf synched but I couldn't see it. Open iBooks and tap on the word Books in the bar across the top of the bookshelf. That opens up a new screen that lets you choose from Books, Purchased Books and PDF's. Tap PDF's and you should see all your pdfs.

This process worked for me as well. I am moving from a gen 1 iPad to a new one and I have a ton of pdfs in iBooks. After reading all the posts, I first moved all my pdfs from each collection (I had several collections in iBooks to organize my files) into the top file of Books in the iBooks app on the old iPad. Then I backed it up to my computer using iTunes and a physical connection. I disconnected old iPad and connected the new iPad. In iTunes, under Books, I could now see all the files and could uncheck any that I did NOT want to sync into the new iPad. Clicked on Apply and bingo - all of them are now in iBooks on the new iPad.

However, I still have to go through and re-sort them into collections to organize them. Big pain but faster than the email solution. I have learned my lesson - all pdfs go to Dropbox or GoodReader in the future. No more iBooks for me. And Apple should have foreseen that this change would not do their app any good in the eyes of users.

So I had this issue too and you should try this first which I did:

I found a solution for this problem.

In Part 3 and 4, I ended up automating the repeating steps of this lengthy process.

The PDF files then show up correctly as PDFs under the Books tab of the iDevice.

Note that it doesn't work changing all of the files at once in Part 3 and 4.

In Part 3, don't change the Media Kind to Podcasts. Your files might vanish.

Part 1 was needed in order to make changing the Media Kind of the files possible. You might not need it.

Here's the full process. I hope it helps.

Part 1:

Select all PDF files,

secondary-click them,

click Get Info,

select the Option tab,

change their Media Kind to Books

and click the OK button.

Part 2:

Create a new playlist and add all the PDF files to it.

Part 3:

Go to the playlist with all PDF files,

select the first PDF file,

secondary-click it,

click Get Info,

select the Option tab and,

change its Media Kind to Music,

click the Next button and

repeat the last two steps for the remaining PDF files.

Then click the OK button.

Part 4:

Go to the playlist with all PDF files,

select the first PDF file,

secondary-click it,

click Get Info,

select the Option tab and,

change its Media Kind back to Books,

click the Next button and

repeat the last two steps for the remaining PDF files.

Then click the OK button.

Part 5:

Delete the playlist created in Part 2 if desired.

But then it didn't work for me... So then what I did was:

1) go to the playlist that has all your PDF files

2) secondary-click on it

3) go down to "add to playlist"

4) select your device

5) you should see itunes "updating files on device"

6) it should appear in your ibooks

I had this problem too. In the end I saved the pdf file to the desktop then connected my iPhone to the computer. In iTunes I opened the drop down menu under my phone's name and dragged the pdf from the desktop into Books. Syncd and the pdf appeared in iBooks.

Thank you so much; I would have never of thought of this. I hope you have a great day! You just made my hour bus ride tomorrow quite enjoyable :]