Sync iBooks from iPad to Mac

I know, that's what I said in that reply

Yeah, I thought that's what you were saying, but it seemed a little ambiguous to me so I figured no harm in confirming it in case it wasn't clear to someone else who reads it. That turned out to be the critical piece of advice for me!

I'm still trying to comprehend the interplay between my iMac iBooks program and the iBooks app on my iPad. I've pretty much figured out how to do what follows by attaching my iPad to my iMac & doing your Transfer Purchases thing. But I want to do all this wirelessly.

I have three objectives:

1. download reading material from the internet directly to my iPad, then have them all automatically transfer to my iMac over wifi.

What I don't understand about this is how to make the transfer automatic. I do have Summary>Options>Sync over wi-fi enabled. So maybe it will just happen.

2. download reading material from the internet to my iMac, then be able to select & transfer them to my iPad wirelessly. This one puzzles me a little - it appears to me that I have to go into the iMac iTunes program and do Transfer Purchases, even if the items transfer wirelessly. But again, maybe it will just happen.

3. delete things I've read from my iPad without deleting them from my iMac. It appears to me that once things are on the iMac, they will remain there even after I've deleted them from the iPad. So if I can solve 1 & 2, it will make 3 easy enough. I just have to be careful about when I delete, because my experience is that whenever wi-fi is involved, there's a lag time in syncing. But what puzzles me here is whether wireless syncing occurs over the cloud, in which case the devices don't have to be on the same network, or if the devices both have to be on the same network to sync wirelessly.

I'll be trying to test out all three, but if you know how this is supposed to work and can give me pointers, I'd appreciate your advice!

I don't use wifi syncing, I still use a cable (never got around to changing), so I'm not 100% if things work exactly the same for both, but I would have thought that if there are differences that they would be small.

1, you need to do Transfer Purchases, it won't be done automatically

2, if you download them on your Mac you need to add them to iBooks on your Mac (or iTunes if the Mac isn't on Mavericks or Yosemite) and they should then show on the iPad's Books tab in iTunes for selecting and syncing. Transfer Purchases is for copying items from the device to the computer.

3, deleting books and/or PDFs from iBooks on your iPad shouldn't have any affect on what shows in iBooks (or iTunes) on your Mac. If you delete them from your Mac then they might also get deleted from your iPad, depending upon what sync options you have (e.g. All Books or if that book/PDF was in your sync selection).

neenak wrote:

I downloaded PDFs to iBooks on iPad and they won't sync to Mac.

How do I sync my iBooks Collections?

I think AirDrop may be a helpful way to transfer your PDFs iBook from iPad to Mac when you turn it on on both iPhone and Mac. But if you tend to sync, iTunes offer hands to help you download PDFs ibooks from iPad.

1. Plug iPhone to computer and open iTunes.

2. Click "Books" under the settings list.

3. Tick the "Sync books" box.

4. Choose the books you would like to sync to your iPad.

5. Tap "Apply" in the bottom right corner of the iTunes and wait for the process.

Harmon Dow wrote:

Note - even though the menu item refers to Transfer Purchases, it seems to transfer anything downloaded into my iBooks app on my iPad, not just purchases.

I think AirDrop may be a helpful way to transfer your PDFs iBook from iPad to Mac when you turn it on on both iPhone and Mac. But if you tend to sync, iTunes offer hands to help you download PDFs ibooks from iPad.

1. Plug iPhone to computer and open iTunes.

2. Click "Books" under the settings list.

3. Tick the "Sync books" box.

4. Choose the books you would like to sync to your iPad.

5. Tap "Apply" in the bottom right corner of the iTunes and wait for the process.

Hi all,

I've read the majority of replies on this thread and tried many of the suggested fixes, and none of them worked.

What did work was emailing the PDF's to myself and then adding them (once downloaded to my Mac) to iBooks. If it's several related PDF's they will be in the 'All Books' section of iBooks. Provided you've labeled them sequentially, simply complete these steps:

Select necessary files then: File>New Collection from Selection (rename the collection to whatever you desire) and that's about it.

Apologies to anyone that has posted this already...

It might not be the best fix, but it works...

Thank you King_Pengin,

this solved my problem. I have an iPhone 6 and a Mac book pro. I only had to do the first part, Transfer Purchases part when connected to Mac's iTunes and it all the PDF books showed up on my mac book pro, I did not have to the second part, Move Books in your Mac's iBooks app.