Playlist from iTunes syncs to iPhone, but not all songs show up

Hi

I have a similar problem with syncing smart playlists between my devices, but not exactly the same:

I have Apple Music and iCloud Music Library. In iTunes on my PC, I have a smart playlist with 41 entries (3 "is" criteria). On my iPhone, the synced list only has 29 entries. On my iPad, it has 39 entries… When I create a completely new smart PL with the same criteria, it has 41 entries on PC (as expected), again 29 on iPhone and again 39 on iPad! When I copy all entries on PC into a new “dumb” PL, it has 41 entries on all devices! I identified some of the songs that are missing in the PL – they are on the iPhone and I can play them, but somehow not included in the PL.

This only happens to this one PL, not to other ones with similar selection criteria.

I switched off / on Apple Music, iCloud Music Library, Live Updates on/off, deleted all stored music on phone, logged off / on iTunes etc etc. but nothing worked.

Any idea is much appreciated!

try maybe to download songs directly from iTunes store on your iOS device?

It happens the same to me. Smart Playlists appear empty in my iPhone, but the songs are in the iPhone. Playlists are fine, the problem is with Smart Playlists.

I had the same problem, some of my smart playlists showing empty on iPhone after updating to iOS 10. I fixed it by going to iPhone's music tab in iTunes, unchecking all playlists and music sync, applying changes and syncing back music and desired playlists again. Good luck!

Thanks!! It worked!!! Have a nice day!

I am glad there is a workaround, but I still hope Apple fixes this bug. It takes hours to delete and reload my entire music library. Could be an iOS problem, and iTunes problem or both,

This solution does not work for me. I still have several smart playlists (that happen to use either Comment or date filters), that when sync'd with iTunes view and play ok through iTunes (on Windows 10), but on the iPhone 6 (iOS 10.0.2), only some songs show up in the playlists (with "Downloaded" status button for each playlist).

For example, one playlist has 61 songs - all get downloaded to the phone (watched the sync process), but 13 display in the playlist. If I removed downloaded songs from the playlist, I'm left with 2. I've tried copying and recreating single and *all* playlists more than once.

One fix/workaround is to turn off "Live updating" for the playlist. When I did this, the playlist shows all of the songs in the Music app.

Apple, could you please fix this problem ASAP?! Thanks!!

Well this problem continues. I just added 2 new albums to my iTunes library, and they will not download to my iPad or iPhone. This is nuts! Every time I add music I have to delete it all and sync it all over again? Not a viable solution.

I've submitted bug reports to Apple for the iPhone 6s (at http://www.apple.com/feedback/iphone.html) and iPad Pro (at http://www.apple.com/feedback/ipad.html). Would suggest that others do likewise for their devices; if enough people complain, the likelihood of a fix in the near future improves.

I had the same (for smart playlist that were one level deep (ie in a sub folder).

playlist visible but empty on the phone, playlist and songs visible when opening the I-phone in iTunes on the mac...

I went the route of deleting and recreating the smart playlists in this first folder, and to my surprise, the second folder (which contained the same construct had that the songs in the iPhone on the playlist...

So odds are you only need to redo one of them and it my even work by just creating a similar dummy smart list and syncing that one..

I was having the same problem after updating my iPhone to iOS 10. I had a smart playlist of 200 songs, all of which synced to the iPhone, but only 154 actually appeared in the playlist. I realised that I had the setting "Convert higher bit rate songs to '128 kbps' AAC" was enabled, and it was in fact those tracks that weren't showing up. I turned off that setting, removed all music then re-synced and everything was fine. It seems, for me at least, the issue was something to do with the conversion during sync, or the generated AAC files themselves.

I can't guarantee this will work for everyone, but it might be worth trying if you're having the same issue.

I believe if you turn off conversion, iTunes replaces at least the songs it was down converting, possibly more. I'm guessing it winds up being the functional equivalent of removing then re-adding all of your music. FWIW, I do not use down conversion, but the remove/re-add step, while really time consuming, continues to be the only way to get new music onto my iDevices.

Well, with latest sw updates to iTunes 12.5.2.36 and iOS 10.1, this problem still is not fixed!

The only way for me to get certain playlists to sync fully is to turn off Live Update, sync, and turn on Live Update again. Very painful! Also, sync frequently would simply *hang* on the first song. Workaround was to remove all or most playlists, and resync (not sure yet if this is fixed or not).

I've submitted a bug report to Apple for these issues at http://www.apple.com/feedback/iphone.html but it apparently hasn't done any good.

Apple, if this isn't fixed very shortly. You are saying "goodbye" to a long-time iPhone & iTunes customer!... Hello, Android!...

I am experiencing the same issue. I have unchecked all of my smart playlists and await an official fix. I should mention that I am an Apple Music subscriber, yet only use the service when I want to listen to a song on-demand that is not already in my library. I do not want to use the Apple Music Library, so playlists that I create on my machine are important.

Good news: with iOS 10.2 and iTunes 12.5.4, my music is once again synchronizing. iTunes 12.5.4 by itself did not accomplish this feat. Only after I also installed 10.2 on my iPhone 6s did all my music (and podcasts) once again synchronize with my iPhone.

Finally...!