iBooks not synching PDF files across Mac and iPhone

Question

Level 1

108 points

iBooks not synching PDF files across Mac and iPhone

I just added two PDF files to iBooks on my Macintosh. I want to be able to read these PDFs in iBooks on my iPhone. However, they don't appear on my iPhone.

Initially I looked in the PDF category in iBooks on my iPhone. They weren't there.

Since that didn't work, I created a new Collection in iBooks on my Mac and added the PDFs to that Collection. Let's say I called the Collection "Companion Documents". On my Mac it has two PDF files in it.

When I look at iBooks on my iPhone, the "Companion Documents" Collection is visible, but it is empty. It doesn't contain any PDFs.

These are not large files. One is 371 KB, the other is 2 MB.

How can I get these files to appear in iBooks on all my devices?

I'm running the latest version of High Sierra on my Mac (10.13.2) and the latest version of iOS on my iPhone 6 (11.2).

Thanks in advance.

iPhone 6, iOS 11.2

Posted on Dec 19, 2017 7:09 AM

Reply

Answer 1

picas

Level 7

21,069 points

Dec 20, 2017 8:19 PM in response to Andrew Shalit

To enable iBooks syncing on a Mac open system preferences and turn on iCloud, select iCloud Drive options and turn on iBooks. Hide iCloud Books is within the app itself:

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Answer 2

picas

Level 7

21,069 points

Dec 20, 2017 2:35 PM in response to Andrew Shalit

Is it enabled on your Mac? Also check that Hide iCloud Books isn't turned on your iPhone. There have been a

lot of complaints about issues with syncing and iBooks. If the iCloud syncing problems continue use the traditional method of syncing with iTunes or email the pdfs.

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Answer 3

picas

Level 7

21,069 points

Dec 19, 2017 2:18 PM in response to Andrew Shalit

It sounds like you haven't enabled iCloud Drive for iBooks.

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Answer 4

Andrew Shalit Author

Level 1

108 points

Dec 20, 2017 5:23 PM in response to picas

picas wrote:

Is it enabled on your Mac? Also check that Hide iCloud Books isn't turned on your iPhone. There have been a

lot of complaints about issues with syncing and iBooks. If the iCloud syncing problems continue use the traditional method of syncing with iTunes or email the pdfs.

The Mac version has an preference for "Sync bookmarks, highlights, and collections across devices." The preference is checked. It apparently doesn't cause PDF files to sync.

The iPhone version of iBooks doesn't have an option to show/hide iCloud books, as far as I can tell.

I realized that I can get the PDFs onto my iPhone by e-mail them to myself. That's quite the kludge, though, when they should just sync.

I just submitted feedback to Apple about this, requesting they address this shortcoming.

Thanks for your help.

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Answer 5

Andrew Shalit Author

Level 1

108 points

Dec 20, 2017 11:45 AM in response to picas

iCloud syncing is turned on. Maybe iBooks doesn't sync content except what you get from the online store. Either that or something is broken on my iPhone, but I can't think what it would be.