How do I copy music onto my Apple iPhone from iTunes?

I'm stumped. With my iPod I simply drag and drop the music I want to take with me from my library onto the iPod on the left side of iTunes, but my Apple iPhone doesn't allow me to do that. How the heck do I put songs on the iPhone without synchronizing my entire (massive) music library?

Dave's Answer:

As with much to do with the iPhone, there's a bit of a trick to getting this working smoothly so you can have control over your iPhone music, while keeping it as darn easy to work with as possible. The answer? Create a custom playlist for your iPhone music library.

Let me show you how to do it - it's pretty darn easy.

Pop into iTunes and choose File --> New Playlist. Now rename it to something logical: I use "iPhone Sync":

Apple iTunes in Mac OS X: New Playlist for iPhone

Now you can just drag and drop music from your iTunes library (in iTunes, needless to say) into this new playlist. When you're ready, you'll see a bunch of music happily ensconced in the playlist (remember, it's all just "pointers": the actual music files are still safely in the main music library, so if you delete something from a playlist , you haven't deleted the original music file itself):

Notice here on the very bottom of the iTunes window it shows you how many songs are in the playlist, along with the size and total playing time. For my current playlist, it's 140 songs, 10.1 hours, for a total file size of 851MB, no problem for my 4GB Apple iPhone.

At this point, you need to plug in your iPhone if you haven't already done so. It'll pop up the usual summary screen:

Cool. Now click on the "Music" tab and you'll see that you can select "sync playlist". Do that, then select the new iPhone sync playlist you've created, as shown here:

Apple iTunes in Mac OS X: Synchronizing New Playlist with iPhone

Set things up just as I have shown and that's all there is to it. Now click "Sync" in iTunes and it'll synchronize your playlist with the iPhone music library and next time you click on that ole' "iPod" button on the iPhone, your selections from you music library will be present.

Oh, and one really nice feature of creating this playlist is that you can manage it, adding and deleting songs to your heart's desire, even without your iPhone present. Whatever changes you make are instantly applied to your iPhone music library the very next time you synchronize the device. Suddenly even 8GB might feel small. :-)

Still learning about your iPhone? We have lots of iPhone help here on the site!

More Useful iPhone and Cell Phone Help Articles:

✔ How do I turn off autocorrect on my iPhone 5?

I'm fed up. Every time I try to send a text message on my iPhone it "fixes" my spelling and changes words from...

✔ How do you share an iPhone photo on Facebook?

All my friends have figured out the magic to take photos on their iPhone and upload them to Facebook. Everyone but me. How...

✔ Closed captioning for TV shows and movies on my iPhone?

Hey Dave, I saw your article from a few days about How to Turn on Closed Captioning in iTunes and am wondering if...

✔ How do I create location-based iPhone reminders?

Thanks to Siri, I've become a big fan of the Reminders app on my iPhone. Being able to say "remind me at 3pm...

✔ Enable Apple 2-Step Verification in iTunes?

I keep reading all these articles about iTunes account security and people having their accounts hacked. I have 2-step security verification set up...

Let's stay in touch!

Sign up for my weekly AskDaveTaylor Newsletter and you'll receive even more tech and gadget help right to your inbox, along with exclusive news and industry updates. It's good stuff. I promise!

Categorized: Mac OS X Help , iPhone and Cell Phone Help (Article 7470, Written by Dave Taylor)
Tagged: apple iphone, apple itunes, mac os x
Previous: How do I download photos to my Apple iPhone?
Next: Why can't I watch a movie I just bought in iTunes?

Reader Comments To Date: 647

monique johnson said, on November 19, 2012 5:42 PM:

followed instructions but it says either i phone cannot be located or i phone has stopped responding after it copies the files, then I have to use task master to get rid of the message

William Hutchful said, on November 22, 2012 9:36 AM:

thanks man

Ashlei said, on November 24, 2012 1:11 PM:

Thank you it worked!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thomas Griggs said, on December 1, 2012 6:55 AM:

Put me on your list as yet another fan. Very helpful.

Brandon said, on December 2, 2012 2:26 PM:

Have music bought on music app can't download to make ringtone plz help

Magryan said, on December 6, 2012 12:44 PM:

It really help.
Thanks Dave:)

boticles said, on December 11, 2012 9:34 AM:

i dunno, i hate itunes.
being used to the simple pc drag and drop option i just use this program called Phonestick.
it lets you mount your iphone or any idevice and use it like a simple usb device.

TRUST ME it's better then this.
check it http://download.cnet.com/Phone-Stick/3000-18546_4-75742384.html

Gabriel said, on December 12, 2012 5:51 PM:

I did what you said and i still can not get new music on mi I-phone. the play list apears in it but no songs

Sandi said, on December 15, 2012 6:59 PM:

Thanks, someone who understands the importance of clear concise instructions for those over 40 trying to learn new tricks! I have music!

Ash said, on December 16, 2012 9:45 PM:

Thank you so much! the only website which helped me get all my music back. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU

Kevin said, on December 18, 2012 9:32 PM:

Hi Dave
Thanks for that but I still had problems until I realised (English spelling)that every song needs to be ticked to be copied.

Thank you though. It did sort my problem.

Kevin

C Isaia said, on December 20, 2012 2:25 AM:

Thank you Dave, your advice re uploading itunes onto iphone worked a treat - you've ended 2012 for me on a high note! Merry Christmas to you & yours

aahliah said, on December 21, 2012 12:20 AM:

yes after 10yrs lol i finally got it..thank you dave!

claire innes said, on December 23, 2012 2:35 PM:

Thanks SO MUCH!! have been trying to work it out for a long time!! really well laid out and easy to follow, thanks again so much!!

Claire

Jaycee said, on December 24, 2012 2:33 PM:

Amazing..simple and it works!
I've been struggling with this for ages..creating a synch playlist worked for me.
Many thanks Dave!
happy Christmas.
JC

laura said, on December 28, 2012 4:16 AM:

omg thanks so much!!!!!!!!!!

Chris said, on December 30, 2012 12:45 AM:

Hi,

This worked for me perfectly. Thank you so much.

candice said, on December 30, 2012 2:37 PM:

Brilliant! Made so easy - thank you so much!!! Have a Happy New Year! Candice :-)

Carol said, on December 30, 2012 7:05 PM:

I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. You are the best!!!!!! I tried doing it myself and got some music, but then started having trouble since I didn't want everything from my computer. You have been so helpful. I tried other sites and one gave a really nasty comment about reading the manual which I don't have. I tried downloading the manual, but couldn't find the information. I am a retired teacher and you showed me how to do what I needed just like a teacher. You are my iHero.

Barb said, on December 31, 2012 8:16 AM:

Thanks Dave - your instructions were spot on and I am loving life even more - music truly is medicine for the soul!

Heather said, on January 3, 2013 1:34 PM:

My daughter downloaded itunes onto our computer when she got her ipod. At that time we had internet. We no longer have internet, but the itunes account/library is still on our computer. I recently got an iphone4 and want to put some music on it. Can I do that using her itunes account/her library of songs and if so can I do it with no internet connection?

Yashaswini said, on January 4, 2013 9:58 PM:

I have created playlist to transfer songs from laptop to my iPhone ..
After this step I m getting any further procedure.
Plz help Me through this

norene said, on January 7, 2013 5:34 PM:

very hepfull. Thanks a lot.

alona said, on January 13, 2013 2:38 AM:

sorry ...
but yor idea had not work ....
but again thanks ...

tim said, on January 13, 2013 5:44 PM:

Good lookin out Dave!

Anh said, on January 20, 2013 3:33 AM:

Hi Dave,
I followed your instructions & the sync process erased all my current songs on iPhone & replaced by the songs in the playlist :( I wanted to add more songs, not to replace hundreds of current songs by just a few new ones!!! Could you please help?
Thanks!

Roddy Hilton said, on January 22, 2013 8:34 AM:

Can you please explain in plain english. As if you were explaining to a grandmother that has never used her iphone before. What EXACTLY do i push on my phone, etc. not slang words.

Mary said, on January 23, 2013 5:00 PM:

Thanks for Helpful tips Dave x

Andy said, on January 24, 2013 2:17 PM:

Dave - Many Thanks!! This helped a lot, now I can import as need be.
Your a power homebre!!!

Te'Nia Davis said, on January 26, 2013 6:56 PM:

this was very helpful but I don't want to delete my other things... PLEASE HELP!!!
thnx!

Shivam said, on January 28, 2013 6:33 AM:

Awesome bro thanks a lot for the help

Dave Taylor said, on January 28, 2013 4:47 PM:

You'll want to use something like Senuti to get everything off your device before you sync and lose whatever you've got on there now. Try this link:

http://www.askdavetaylor.com/about_senuti.html

to find my tutorial on the subject!

Dave Taylor said, on January 28, 2013 10:30 PM:

test 2

Asker said, on February 3, 2013 5:46 AM:

Awesome! Thanks. But it is even more utterly awesome that Apple has implemented this awkward and anti-intuitive interface on iOS devices. apple, time to deliver de DECENT interface, like the Mac interface. I want to be in control, not the other way round. I want to see the iOS device as I see a Mac, with all its files and folders, and I want to move, copy, paste and delete stuff as I do in a Mac. And I want a factory-jailbroken iOS device, of course. Because it is my stuff. Or else competitors will take advantage!

Gary said, on February 10, 2013 7:47 AM:

Instructions worked perfectly. Thanks so much for the help.

Kylie said, on February 15, 2013 2:16 PM:

Thanks Dave, this is the second time I'm using these helpful instructions. The steps varied a bit for the iPhone 5 but I was able to get the selected songs in a playlist and then on my new phone. Today I wanted to add a couple more tracks and after searching for an hour to make this happen this link popped up again and I was able to figure it out and add two more songs to the playlist. Thank you for this link! Whew.

Kimie said, on February 20, 2013 3:49 PM:

Thank you for this post. I was having the hardest time figuring this out. Great directions... it was so easy! Thanks again. :)

Mike said, on March 9, 2013 8:31 PM:

My wife and I just got iPhones - the playlist worked like a charm. Thank you for the great instructions on syncing the playlist to our phones. I will continue to monitor your informative site if I have any more questions or problems. Thanks again.

Deborah said, on April 3, 2013 9:52 PM:

My computer reconizes my iphone but not itunes, no summary widow pops up. Any idea what is wrong?

Vlad said, on April 6, 2013 11:01 AM:

That explanation was so competent and to the point. It leads to a question, though< why does it have to be so difficult that we need a smart expert to explain it to us? Thanks for that explanation!!!!

Raymond Harrison said, on April 15, 2013 5:48 PM:

Just want to thank you for helping me transfer files from my PC to my iPhone may God bless you and prosper you.

Cate said, on April 23, 2013 10:48 PM:

Yours was the one instruction from how to move playlists from iTunes 11.0.2 to iphone 4 that made sense to me. I made the new playlist as instructed (which wasn't ideal since this is actually 6 playlists - hypnosis tracks etc for different birthing purposes..TMI - i get to music tab, check synch music - then receive this message "Are you sure you want to remove existing music, movies, TV shows, books, and tones from this iPhone and sync with this iTunes library?" and the sub choices - entire music library, selected playlists..., include music videos etc are not selectable. Two hours later I am tearing my hair out.
My client - giving birth in a few weeks will be very grateful and so will I.

TIA.

(MAC 10.8.3 if that matters)

Sue said, on April 24, 2013 12:49 PM:

It was a little different for the iphone 5, but fairly easy. Thank you!

richbitch89 said, on May 10, 2013 5:45 PM:

thank you so much!! I synced my ipod by accident and lost all of my music. such a bummer; you saved my music life.

Rick said, on May 15, 2013 11:48 AM:

Dave,

I followed your instructions for transferring music from my iTunes library to my iPhone 5 and it worked beautifully. Thanks a million!

Rick

kobie said, on May 15, 2013 10:17 PM:

Hi
I want to thank you so much for your article on downloading music to my iphone
Making the playlist synced my music to my iphone right away
I had spent a frustrating day doing many many things...all set and happy :)
thanks so much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Kobie

Karen said, on May 24, 2013 7:55 PM:

Thank you heaps mate!!! You solved m dilemma!!! =D

I do have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but first I'd like to say thank you, Dave, for all your helpful information by buying you a cup of coffee!

« First | Previous | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | All 7 Pages

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!

How do I copy music onto my Apple iPhone from iTunes?

Reader Comments To Date: 647

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!

Check This Out Too...