iOS 9/iTunes 12.3 not syncing app through devices

Ok I think I figured it out. Go into the Itunes store, and make sure you're logged in. (Click on account.) After that, go back to the home page and click on Purchases. It should have all of your apps there. Click the download all button, and boom! Worked for me, hope it does for you! My iPhone was plugged in.

Yes you can re-download previously purchased apps but this does not help with the management of bandwidth. Downloading again just uses up scarce bandwidth. For some that may not be a problem but with bandwidth constraints it is a problem.

The simple solution would be:

iTunes —> (Account) menu —> Purchased —> Apps —> All —> (iPhone or iPad) —> then download all apps you’d like to appear at Apps Sync tab at your phone window of iTunes.

But as SantafeNM says, we've always been able to re-download apps to our computers, I don't believe that was a problem for anyone on this thread.

I have always been able to download to my computer and synch across to any of my Apple devices. I do not use iCloud. I also keep all of my iTunes content on my computer and back it up regularly.

In the past I was also able to download direct to device when an update showed, and then when I synched that device the updated app transferred to my computer into iTunes and updated my stored app so I could then synch it to my other devices. This was at a time when I had a limited broadband account so helped keep my broadband usage down and avoid additional costs each month.

Now you cannot synch an app update from a device to your computer. You either update direct to each device or update to computer and synch to device.

I don't have a particularly fast broadband connection, although it is now unlimited (and I notice even the limited service my provider used to have has now changed to unlimited which resulted in the charge for my own account dropping to the amount they used to charge those who had a limited allowance - good result). I still prefer to have everything backed up to computer (and external hard drive back up) and I do have a 2 TB hard drive on this PC so plenty of capacity.

From what has been said previously on this thread Apple intended us to no longer be able to synch apps from device to computer, but they still let us synch from computer to device. So yes, if your device will not update apps then you would need to follow the path of re-downloading apps from your purchased option to computer and then synch across, that has not changed and is as it has always been.

The issue here is the two way sync its not working any longer before on iTunes you could update an app on your iPhone or iPad and then sync your device on iTunes and the app will also be update on your iTunes library on you mac this feature was handy for people who own a lot of devices and there bandwidth is limited now you have to update every device individually or first update the app on iTunes and then sync your devices on iTunes.

wait for the next update, it will be solved

wait until next update

Has Apple advised you that the next update they will change this and permit us to download to one device and then synch that back to our computer to be able to then synch to our other devices? And what update? iTunes? the OS? OS 10 does not allow this just as OS 9 didn't because that is now how Apple wants updates to be handled.

If they have not then I guess they are not going to change their stance.

What you say is pretty much what I have been saying on various posts on this site (not just in this thread). I have unlimited bandwidth these days so it wouldn't be a big problem to update all devices via wi fi. Most broadband providers are now offering unlimited as their basic offer, but some do use mobile broadband rather than having a fixed home account so some are still affected if they sync via the cloud rather than download to computer and then synch to devices.

There is a new Itunes update today, hopefully this will take care of the iOS app update issue.

Cheers,

Kairos

I haven't got a new update today - on 12.5.1.21 which was the update on 13th September, but that continues with the plan Apple have of not synching apps from device to computer but still allowing synch from computer to device.

I really don't think this is something that Apple are going to fix as it wasn't something that was broken in the first place, as with the removal of the headphone port, they don't want two way synch for apps any more.

I had this problem too and no joy with internet searches. Went poking around in iTunes and found the solution. Make sure your computer is authorised in the Account/Authorisation menu. Using MAC OS Sierra, iTunes 12.5.1.

In iTunes, in ‘Account’ menu, select ‘Purchased’. In the upper right of the new screen, make sure 'Apps' is selected. In the middle, there should be two options, ‘All’ and ‘Not in my library’. Select this last one, and all the apps that have not appeared in iTunes will be there. In the lower right corner, select ‘Download all’ or select them individually.

I had over 140 apps sitting here! It will take a while for all the apps to download to iTunes but this solved my issue.

If I understand you are downloading previously purchased apps but this does not help with the management of bandwidth. For some that may not be a problem but with bandwidth constraints it is a problem. Once it was possible to use public Wi-Fi to acquire apps and updates on one device, come home and sync to iTunes and then transfer them to other devices. That seems to no longer be possible.

You can download an updated app to iTunes and then sync to as many devices as you have. Apps no longer sync from the device into iTunes as the app stored on the device no longer contains all of the optimised code and content required to work on any possible device. This keeps the footprint of each app on your device smaller, which is useful.

tt2

All of those suggestions to re-download apps from the purchased list are not solving the issue but rather putting a band-aid on it. Previously, if you downloaded a new app on your iPhone / iPad or updated an app on your iPhone / iPad, if you plugged that iPhone / iPad into the computer and clicked sync, the new apps, and updated apps would transfer through to iTunes. This no longer happens, requiring users to manually download new apps, and update existing apps twice, once on their iPhone / iPad and once in iTunes. This as some have mentioned is an issue if you do not have unlimited home broadband, and it is also a waste of time to download and update apps twice. For me, this issue has been ongoing since iOS 8.3, on my iPhone 6, and iTunes version 12.1.2.27

I found a comment to an article online a while ago, but unfortunately do not remember where I read it, that said that this is due to the app thinning feature of iOS 9 where apps only download incremental updates or the pieces of code/files they need. For example, an iPhone SE does not need the same graphics files, with the same resolution, as an iPad Pro 12.9 would. Therefore, each iPhone / iPad downloads a "different" portion of each app while iTunes downloads the entire app, and as a result, any apps downloaded or updated on an iPhone / iPad cannot transfer over to the computer because it is not the exact same app.

I really hope Apple will fix this, and I really hope someone from Apple is reading this forum.

I am on the iTunes version 12.5.1.21; iOS version 10.0.2; and iPhone 7 Plus