IOS 8 won't sync music with itunes

Although you're referring to a newer iPhone and a newer version of iOS, Apple has still not fixed the sync bug as of October, 2017.

If you need a reliable iPhone, do not sync music to it from iTunes.

The bug could affect you at any time, forcing you to spend hours on a full restore operation. Imagine if you were traveling, didn't have access to a computer (necessary for full restoration), or had slow Internet access (the iOS restore download now stands at 3 GB)!

The Media Library Daemon -- software that manages music in iOS -- accesses memory inappropriately, which causes a crash known as a "segmentation fault". The software cannot recover: you will be left with (at best) phantom tracks on the iOS device or (at worst) all in-use storage marked as "Other", a Music app that won't launch at all, and no possibility of syncing again.

Crash log documenting the bug: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8120395

The present discussion now stands at 58 pages, and there are countless more threads about the same problem, both in the Apple Support Communities and on other Internet forums. It should be clear by now that Apple has no intention of fixing iTunes-to-iOS music sync.

This does not work. I have been syncing with a cable from the outset

Please give us a meaningful answer. My new Iphone 8 will not allow any transfers of music from my Mac Pro 2015

abacai, the topic for this thread is about iOS 8, not iPhone 8; you may want to look at newer threads for help with your issue.

I have the same problem with an iPhone 6, iOS 8, iTunes 11.4 (18) and Mac OS X 10.9.4.

I can’t transfer any music on the iPhone with iTunes, except for two of my about 17 000 tracks, both of which are just over 100 minutes in length. I have iTunes Match (which I turned off on the iPhone) and all matched audio files are already re-downloaded from the iTunes Store. Audiobooks do get synced, although some chapters that iTunes shows as transferred aren’t available on the iPhone. Podcasts seem to sync normally.

For now, I turned on iTunes Match on the iPhone again to at least be able to listen to Music, but this has the major disadvantage that playlist management doesn't work at all (playlists can't seem to be deleted on iTunes Match, iPhone “flattens out” the folder structure and shows all playlist on the top level). A solution for this would be great, I don't think everyone has iTunes Match and the “widescreen iPod with touch controls”-feature was one of my main reasons to buy an iPhone.

Hi Coveholli,

If you are having an issue with your iPhone not showing your music after the iOS update, and you have attempted to sync it with iTunes, I would suggest that you troubleshoot using the steps in these articles -

First, close all applications and try again -

iOS: Force an app to close

Next if the first step doesn't resolve it, turn your iPhone off and back on again -

Turn your iOS device off and on (restart) and reset

And again if not resolved, restore your iPhone as a new device, after backing up any data on it -

iOS: How to back up your data and set up your device as a new device

Thanks for using Apple Support Communities.

Best,

Brett L

I am having this problem too. I upgraded to iOS 8 and iTunes 11.4. The sync button on the music tab in iTunes s missing completely, and I can't drag and drop songs from my iMac to my iPhone. There appears to be no way of getting music from my computer to my iPhone. I have tried all the suggested solutions, but nothing has worked. If I hit the sync button at the bottom of the iTunes window, it says that the phone is synced, but not music is copied. Under the summary tab, I no longer have the option to manually manage music, only videos. It is incredibly frustrating. Judging from the online chatter, this is a major problem with iOS 8. When can we expect a fix?

No, that doesn’t seem to be the problem. I can locate and play songs in the iTunes library, but I can’t get it to sync with the iPhone. Interestingly, after much backing up and restoring, I could get it to sync with my iPad, but I don’t know what is different. Both iPhone and iPad have iOs 8 installed.

I am restoring for the fourth time. My music all downloaded but after a sync, all of it shows as 'other'. and it shows me over the size limit by 34 gb., which is ridiculous and unachievable. It also shows that I have 400+ songs on my phone when I have over 21000 downloaded. Previously, iTunes would stall at waiting to update files after transferring some files successfully, which led to the first restore. The second restore was because iTunes would not transfer files to the iPhone.The third and fourth restores are due to it showing huge amounts of 'other. Resets and restoring from backups did not resolve. Clearly there is a problem with the way iOS 8 and iTunes 11 interact, at least with the iPhone 6. Why does this stuff get rolled out?

Not on am I having the same issue, but I am showing 14GB under "other" after they sync process got stuck on the step "waiting for change sot be applied" and I canceled it.

iPhone 6 - 128GB

I finally figured out my particular problem, and the solution is stupidly easy. On the summary tab, I clicked "Manually manage videos" and presto, I was able to add music to my iPhone and the button changed to "Manually manage videos and music" and I am now able to sync the the music. Can it be that this was a simple oversight that nobody caught?

Same thing happen to me. The 1st sync went off without an issue and after it showed the content as other. Which at the second sync placed me over the allowed. I have never has an issue with any Apple product. But the reason why I purchased the 128gb iPhone was to take all the music I have with me. In addition the fix can't be to uncheck this or make sure you check this. My iPad with retina display (3rd generation iPad) doesn't have an issue and it is running iOS 8.

I solved my problem yesterday and forgot to post it here: None of the suggested solutions of Brett worked, but I found a tweet by one Wes Pickering (https://twitter.com/wespickering/status/513190762675068929) who proposed unchecking “sync music”, apply the changes, recheck “sync music” and apply again. I did this and turned off the “Convert higher bitrate songs to 128kbps”-option in iTunes and it worked. Also, I restarted my iPhone and MacBook after each “apply changes”-step and this seems to have helped, too.

I don't understand what the problem was, especially since restoring my iPhone did not help. I have the suspicion that the problem was with iTunes, because the syncing process took ridiculously long each time (especially the steps “Start Sync” and “Apply Changes”) – but whatever, now it works.