app updates - iTunes store temporarily unavailable

I have this problem as well. Since it's been the past month or so. Some of the apps update but randomly I get the unavailable message. Then if I try to update the app it complained about, it will work eventually. I was just starting to see if it was me or something else.

Let's hope we an get a quick answer from someone.

Have you tried to start up in Safe mode and see if the problem exists? If not, I can try that. I can also open a call with Apple to see if they can fix it if safe mode doesn't work.

So here is what I did this evening. I booted up in Safe mode (holding the shift key down when booting). I still got the temporarily unavailable message.

I then rebooted normally and attempted to update all the apps. It worked this time. I don't trust this yet as I think it was a fluke, but it did work.

I will try again tomorrow and see if it works. If I get the temporarily unavailable message again, I will contact Apple Support and get them involved.

In the meantime, feel free to try the safe boot and then reboot again and see what kind of results you get.

I have the same problem. It's been happening for the same time period, about a month. It started around when the latest update to iOS came out. I figured the iTunes servers were crashing because of everybody updating their phones. Yet, a month later, here I am with the same problem.

A person here said that rebooting computer in safe mode (hold LEFT SHIFT during restart) made the problem go away.

That worked for me too. I don't know if the fix is permanent, but I was finally able to update my apps. Restart in SAFE MODE (hold LEFT SHIFT), try app updates, and then restart normally.

Thanks. That worked for me too (restart in SAFE MODE, try updates, then restart normally). Finally! I agree about it feeling like a fluke. I wouldn't be surprised if the problem came back. But for now it's gone.

Well that's disappointing and frustrating. This morning, I got the message once. That's the first one since I went through my rebooting method. After that it worked fine. I was going to watch it and see if it happens again.

Is your machine under Applecare? If so you can contact support and see if they have an answer. If not, when it happens again for me, I can capture the screen and contact apple and see what they say since my machine is new and under Applecare.

I got the error again this morning. I have opened a support case with Apple. I'll keep you posted.

The safe-mode reboot did not work for me. This is frustrating, but even MORE frustrating is that you cannot set iTunes to simply keep apps updated all the time.

i have this problem now and on and off over the past week. Sometimes no updates are downloaded, sometimes one or two. Eventually all updated

it would be good to know if apple are aware of this as Apple Status page is showing all green

Ok, I had a conversation with Apple yesterday. Let me give you the short answer and then the long answer.

The tech that I spoke to looked at things and we tried several methods with no luck. Basically when it happens again, I will contact this tech and they will capture information and send it to engineering. When that happens, at least in the past, it can take a couple of weeks to get a response back from the engineering team.

Now for the long answer, which I'm still mulling over in my head. Now some of you may be aware of this, but it came clear to me.

At the moment, I usually update the apps on my iOS devices from the iOS device itself. I also sync my iOS devices with iTunes on my iMac. Normally when I'm in iTunes, I see under the Apps tab that there are updates available and I try to update those as well, which is where we are all seeing the problem.

What I never understood was if I update the apps on my iOS devices and then sync, I assumed the apps on the mac would get updated from the iOS devices. Therefore I never understood why I had to update the apps on the mac as well. Well as it turns out, the iOS devices will not update the apps on the mac. However, when you sync and the mac has updated apps compared to the iOS device, then it will update the apps on the iOS device. For some reason this never sank into my brain, or I just forgot after all these years.

Anyway, after talking to the tech, since the apps are updated on the iOS device and through iCloud, the only purpose the apps serve on the mac in iTunes is to have a copy of the apps. I could if I wanted to delete all those apps i iTunes since they are on the iOS device and in iCloud. So in short, it's an exercise that I may not care about on the mac, since I'm not updating the iOS devices through iTunes. Now that may be different for different people obviously, but it was interesting to hear that opinion.

So the bottom line is when it happens again on my mac, which I would guess will be within a few days, I will contact the tech and they can capture information.

Hope this helps some.

I had this same problem. Someone else mentioned that it was related to the iOS auto-update process. I went to my iPhone, and sure enough, it had the auto-update process ON. I turned it OFF. Then I checked my iPad but found it did not have this on.

Then I opened iTunes and attempted to download all the app updates listed. I had no problems at all. Everything downloaded perfectly.

I think when an app on my iPhone was auto-updated, and iTunes on my Mac went to check for that app in the Updates list, there was a conflict between the iTunes library and the status of the apps on my iPhone. That conflict causes this error.

Turn off automatic app updates on your iOS device(s), then open iTunes and download the offered updates. You may have one more problem session while things get sorted out, but after that, you should have no problems downloading app updates in iTunes.

I would bet that you could have auto-update turned ON for your iPhone (say) and still not have problems downloading app updates in iTunes on your Mac or PC if you don't have your iPhone plugged into your computer at the time you open iTunes and go to download the app updates listed there. iTunes won't have access to your phone to check what's been auto-updated and so will not see any conflicts. The downloads in iTunes should then work as they should. I haven't tried this method but suggest it as something to check if you want to keep auto-update on.

I hope this helps! :-)

Steve

So the problem has reoccurred. The Apple tech will contact me Wednesday morning to collect logs and other information while the problem occurs. She will then send it off the engineering to find out why it is happening. So hopefully within a few weeks we will know the cause of this problem. It may not get fixed for awhile, but hopefully everyone will understand it better.

Daniel, I'm wondering if you saw my May 7, 2016, 9:48PM post just above. This solved my problem, although I continue to monitor my devices.

Did you try my suggested solution and found it did not work for you? If you haven't tried it, perhaps it's worth your time to check it out.

Either way, I'd like to hear from you about whether it helped you or not. Thanks!