stuck on waiting for changes to be applied

After countless hours this past weekend with this same problem (iTunes stuck on "waiting for changes to be applied..." I finally have resolved it without having to completely rebuild my iTunes library (and losing my metadata in the process). For background, I updated my iPhone 4s while I was traveling, and when I returned home, I was no longer to update music in iTunes (it would hang).

The problem, it seems, is related to several factors:

1) you have enabled "Find My iPhone" in the iCloud settings on your iPhone

2) you have initiated a download of music through iTunes on your iPhone, and the downloads have not completed

3) you have a corrupted Voice Memo, causing duplication on each sync

Here's what I ended up doing:

on your iPhone / iPod / iOS device:

1) disabled "Find My iPhone" on the iCloud settings of my iPhone

2) gone to the "Downloads" section of the iPhone "iTunes" app and deleted every in-progress download

3) go to Voice Memos app and see if there are recordings in the list that may have been duplicated

you can also check the "Voice Memos" playlist on your iTunes library

- delete any duplicate Voice Memos; if some memos are gray and can't be deleted see below

4) do a cold reboot (hold down top bottom, power off, then on again) but do not dock your iPhone yet

on your iTunes:

5) change your iTunes -> Devices preference to "Prevent iPods, iPhones, iPads from syncing automatically"

you can now dock / connect your iPhone to iTunes

6) select "Manually manage music and videos" in the Summary tab for your iPhone within iTunes

7) go to the Music tab for your iPhone within iTunes

- you may see a list of music at the bottom called "manually added music"

if present, select all items in this list and Delete to remove them

8) uncheck "Sync Music" at the top of the Music tab and "Apply"

- this will remove all music from your iPhone

9) if the iTunes sync completes properly, perform a Local Backup of your iPhone (you may need this later)

10) re-enable "Sync Music" but uncheck "Voice Memos" and "Apply"

- if this fails, you have a corrupted memo - see below

11) if this sync completes, change your iTunes -> Devices preference to disable "Prevent iPods, iPhones, iPads from syncing automatically"

possibly optional steps needed:

a) make sure you have a backup of all of your Voice Memos (check iTunes)

you may want to copy off these files and then remove them from iTunes, especially if there are duplicates

b) if your Voice Memos database is corrupted, you may need to clear out the iPhone internal database

there are third party utilities (I used "iPhone Disk") that let you access the directory even on a non-jailbroken phone

b) remove all files from the "Recordings" directory

c) cold-boot your iPhone

d) repeat steps above

Again, this sounds painful (it was!) but after many tries, this is what finally allowed my iPhone 4s with iOS 7 to once again sync properly with iTunes 11.1. This process will preserve your iPhone settings, voicemails, Messages, etc. And, it will let you retain your iTunes library without rebuilding.

After hours of frustrations i finally found a solution and hope it helps everyone that comes across this post.

1. Disconect your iDevice

2. Sign Out of your appleID acount on Itunes Store > Sign Out

3. Close iTunes

4. Conect your iDevice (dont go opening iTunes just yet)

5. Follow this short support guide http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1451

6. Check the Libraries you want to sync

7. Click "Sync" and if it gets stuck again on "waiting for changes to be applied" click on the small cancell 'x' and your content will beggin copying on your iDevice

hope this helped, i worked for me after hours and hours of trying diferent methods.

I really don't appreciate the fact that no one from Apple seems to be dealing with the many, many threads that have started on this topic since iOS 7 came out. In any event, I seem to have solved my problem with a full software restoration -- that is, iOS software restoration.

I clicked on "Restore iPhone..." which does a complete reinstall of the iOS but also all apps, photos, songs, etc. Took about 45 minutes, but seems to have worked.

I had previously tried reverting to a backup of my iPhone, but that did not solve the problem. Only a full restore solved it.

Hey, this worked for me.

Thank you 🙂

Some other things to consider:

- Make sure your USB and USB driver are not faulty. I found myself using the other port, too, as it didn't work the first time.

- Reboot your device before performing the instruction.

The most problematic thing when stuck on "waiting for changes to be applied" is that canceling the process would make a mess of the information about the storage space on iPhone. iTunes report that all disk space of iPhone is "other", instead of specifyig the correct categories (audio, books, apps, etc.). It would not sync if I click on Sync button.

The only solution I found was to shutdown both iPhone and my MacBook, restarting them again. When connected again, iTunes give correct report about the storage space of iPhone.

Best regards,

Aleksandar

iTunes iPod Stuck on Waiting for Changes to be Applied

This fix does not require anything except an update to your iOS software.

Go to the App Store under the Apple on your computer

Under the Store Menu at the top of the screen, go down to select updates

If there are updates, they will appear in a pop-up window in the top right of your computer screen. Click on the window to update.

You will have to save any files (i.e. Microsoft Office) that are open and restart your computer

It will say that the iPod is syncing, do you still want to quit, say yes

Shut your iPod down completely by pressing the button on the top edge of the iPod

Disconnect your iPod from the USB port on your computer

When your computer restarts

Make sure that both your computer and your iPod are on the same Network

Make sure that both your computer and your iPod have the same Apple ID

Turn your iPod back on by pressing the button on the top edge of your iPod

Plug your iPod back into the USB port on your computer

Go to iTunes, and it will be syncing correctly

This issue is something I've been dealing with for months on my iPod Touch 64 GB and my PC running iTunes. I use it only to listen to podcasts and music, and it constantly gets stuck at "Waiting for changes to be applied" - and stalls there for a good 20 minutes before concluding. Then when I check the content on my iPod, album artwork goes missing and many of the day's new podcasts have not actually synced.

The only solution I have had is to do a full restore, set it up as a new iPod and then sync it all over again. That process takes over an hour, but it's the only way I have found to get all of my new content sync'd along with my old. After that first successful sync, any future attempts to sync again cause album artwork to get lost, podcasts fail to sync and I'm left needing to restore all over again.

I've followed pretty much every solution I can find - I've completely disabled iCloud on my iPod, tried to let it sync everything, tried letting it only sync selected tracks. Tried fooling around with disconnecting and reconnecting and attempting the sync over wi-fi. I've replaced the USB cable. None of these have provided me with a solution to the problem.

At this point I'm concluding that Apple simply doesn't care about support on iTunes, or support for people who listen to podcasts, or support for their older products. They want you to go wireless and use the data provided to your phone by your service carrier. I'm beyond fed up and have decided that if a solution doesn't present itself I'm giving up and removing all apple products from my life. I'll go buy a google pixel or whatever if it means I don't have to deal with this crap anymore.

a

5. Follow this short support guide http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1451

"Short support guide"? That involves nuking your music library and recreating it from an XML import, which is a huge deal for many of us who have large libraries, and don't want to lose metadata, dates, etc.

This "waiting for changes to be applied" bug has ruined the fun of a new iPhone 5s.

I'm having this issue as well. I've signed in and out of iTunes store both on my iPhone and MacBook. Both have been restarted too. All that beta testing, and for what? A device that won't sync? Really, Apple??? Tick, tock, tick, tock... *sigh*

I am seriously irritated. My iPod touch version 5 was a fully functioning music player until I upgraded to iOS 7. I might take it to the a genius at the Apple store or wait for a fix. How could these computer programming giants screw up something SOOOO basic? SMH. Also, since I've had this darn thing the screen presses it's own buttons. They haven't bothered to fix that EITHER!!!

That sounds like awesome troubleshooting. I will try it, although I've already deleted all voice memos from my library. An Apple Genius told me on Saturday that voice memos are known as a source of sync problems. I spent three hours with him at the 14th St. NYC store. The problem is still not resolved. I am able to sync, but the "Waiting for changes to be applied" message lasts for at least 15 minutes every time.

Hello all - same issue here. I have an iPod touch, no voice messages like those above so not sure why I seem to have the problem. In any case, I found that if I sync wirelessly, it works. If I connect via USB to my iMac, the sync gets stuck on "waiting for changes to be applied". One other note, I am rebooting the iMac and the touch between each sync event. Not sure if this is helping, but I've been slowly rebuilding by touch with 50gb of music 10gb at a time.

Good luck...

2) you have initiated a download of music through iTunes on your iPhone, and the downloads have not completed

This seemed to be it for me. I went in to the iTunes Store app on my iPhone and there was a stuck download. I deleted it, and now my sync is finally working. Thanks!

I just updated my iPhone 4 to IOS7 and had the same problem.

I disabled the auto sync in iTunes like in step 5 of cpaulPHL post. After that I connected my iPhone to iTunes and selected the Devices> Transfer Purchases from "my iPhone".

This took a long time and seemed to transfer everything. This completed and then after that I was able to sync with no problem even after turning find my iphone on again.