How To Update Icloud Library On Mac Rating: 5,1/10 8609 votes

2020-3-3  Update your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch to the latest iOS or iPadOS, your Mac to the latest macOS, and your Apple TV to the latest tvOS.; Set up iCloud on all of your devices.; Make sure that you’re signed in to iCloud with the same Apple ID on all of your devices that you want to use with iCloud Photos.; If you have a Windows PC, update to Windows 7 or later and download iCloud for Windows. 2020-4-5  iCloud Photo Library, introduced in iOS 8.1, is designed to push photos you take on the iPhone directly to iCloud in order to reduce the space taken by the Camera Roll and have a valuable backup. The photos are accessible from any iOS device (or Mac) connected with your account.

Are you a big music fan with an extensive library on your Mac? The iCloud Music Library might then be the best place for your music collection, ready to be transported on any device via cloud storage, whether you listen to your beats on your Mac, iPhone, or HomePod.

How does iCloud Music Library work? Think of it as iTunes iCloud — a cloud-based repository of all your music, including songs you've downloaded from Apple Music. In fact, anyone with a subscription to Apple Music or iTunes Match can use it.

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What Is iCloud Music Library?

This guide is a good overview of what is iCloud Music Library and how you use it. Apple itself thinks about it as all the music you have stored in iCloud — a personal repository online with tracks matching the ones from the iTunes Store and the ability to download them to up to 10 of your registered devices.

If you have the new Apple Music subscription, iCloud Music Library is already included. Same with iTunes Match, a service where you can store up to 100,000 songs from your iTunes library in iCloud.

How to add songs to iCloud Music Library

If you're wondering, 'How do I get my iTunes library into iCloud?' or simply come across a good song on Apple Music and would like to add it to your iCloud:

  1. Open iTunes on your Mac
  2. Find the song you'd like to add
  3. Click the More button over the song
  4. Select 'Add to My Music'

Where to see your local music on Mac

Once you have your music in iCloud, you can play it from your Mac, iPhone, or any other Apple device. But where do you find your local music or the songs purchased from the iTunes Music Store? There are two options for accessing your iCloud Music Library. First one:

  1. Open iTunes
  2. Select Music in the dropdown menu
  3. Click View ➙ Only Downloaded Music

Another way to see all the songs stored on your Mac via iCloud Music Library is:

  1. In iTunes, select Music from the dropdown menu
  2. Click on Songs in the sidebar
  3. Open the View menu ➙ Show View Options
  4. Check the iCloud Download box

If the song is only stored in iCloud, a cloud icon with a downward arrow will be shown. For local tracks — no icon. And if the tune is ineligible for iCloud Music Library, it will have a cloud icon crossed out.

How to turn on iCloud Music Library quickly

There's no need to worry how to backup iTunes library to iCloud — your Mac should automatically add your music library after you upload music to iTunes. The only thing you should do is enable iCloud Music Library on your Mac if you have an Apple Music or iTunes Match account.

To enable iCloud Music Library on your Mac with an Apple Music account:

  1. Open iTunes
  2. Click on the iTunes menu ➙ Preferences
  3. Under General, check the iCloud Music Library option

To do the same via iTunes Match:

  1. Open iTunes and find the Account menu
  2. Click Sign Out
  3. Select the Match tab and subscribe (if you're not yet a subscriber)
  4. Select Use iCould Music Library
  5. Click Add This Computer to upload and match your computer's music library to iCloud Music Library

How to disable iCloud Music Library on your Mac

Sometimes you might need to know how to turn off iCloud Music Library. For example, if you don't have a backup of your music collection, you might be worried about losing important metadata. Or you might simply not want to save songs offline from Apple Music.

To turn off iCloud Music Library on your Mac:

How to update icloud music library on mac
  1. Open iTunes
  2. Click on iTunes and then Preferences
  3. Under General, uncheck the iCloud Music Library option

If you do disable your iCloud Music Library, you won't have access to your iTunes Library in the cloud, your Mac's matched or uploaded tracks in other devices, or any saved songs from Apple Music. You'll still have access to any paid iTunes content from the iTunes Music Store across your devices though.

Common issues with iCloud Music Library

By far the most frequent problem is iCloud Music Library not syncing correctly. If you've turned on the iCloud Music Library and your entire library is missing you could easily restore the whole music collection from a backup file.

In case you don't have a backup, chat with Apple Support to help you reset your iCloud Music Library. Check Apple Music Library's troubleshooting guide if you run into more issues.

Update iCloud Music Library within iTunes

If iCloud doesn't update automatically, it's possible to manually update within iTunes as well:

  1. In iTunes, click on File
  2. Select Library
  3. Click Update iCloud Music Library

In the upper-right corner, you can track iCloud Music Library's status in the Activity dialog. Tracks listed as 'Waiting' will be uploaded or matched to your catalog in iTunes or Apple Music.

The best addition to music experience on Mac

True audiophiles don't just listen to iTunes on basic settings. There's a much better way that gives you precise control over the listening experience.

Boom 3D is an app that allows you to get the best performance from your audio hardware. Whether you're listening with in-ear headphones or built-in speakers, Boom 3D simulates the surround sound experience. With advanced equalizer presets, the app will know automatically whether a genre of music playing will sound better with more bass or treble. Now you can effortlessly embrace high-quality listening for all your music.

Always-on iCloud Music Library backups

It's true that Apple's iTunes media downloader and backup manager can be confusing. Luckily, there's a much easier alternative available.

Sync it all with AnyTrans

The easiest way to sync your content across iOS and macOS — AnyTrans. Get the app and bring your data anywhere in a click.

AnyTrans is the most reliable way to sync any information (including music) between your iPhone and Mac. It's a fast and completely customizable transfer manager that exports photos, contacts, backups, and most importantly music, completely bypassing iCloud storage restrictions. You don't even have to use a USB cable — AnyTrans works through WiFi too:

  1. Make sure your iPhone and Mac are on the same WiFi network
  2. Select Device Manager in AnyTrans
  3. Sync the two devices to transfer all photos and videos

For all music lovers with large collections of songs and playlists that need to be used across all devices, AnyTrans and Boom 3D are indispensable, elevating your listening experience on your Mac.

Best of all, both AnyTrans and Boom 3D are available on Setapp, a platform of more than 150 Mac apps and utilities that you can use daily to improve how you interact with your Mac to solve any problem. Now that you know how you can have total control over your music library, it's time to make as many playlists as your heart desires.

iCloud Music Library is Apple's cloud-based repository for all your music (and music you've saved or downloaded from Apple Music). Anyone who has an Apple Music or iTunes Match subscription can take advantage of it. But before you enable iCloud Music Library, there are a few things to know.

Apple Music Subscription

Apple Music is Apple's massive music service, comprising a subscription music catalog, iCloud Music Library syncing across your devices, Beats 1 live and algorithmic radio, customized playlists, and more artist exclusives than you can shake a stick at.

Cloud-based matching can be buggy

iCloud Music Library has come a long way since it first launched with Apple Music in 2015. It syncs more reliably now, and keeps everything in order. But like any computer system, errors are bound to crop up that need your personal attention.

What kind of errors? Stuff like:

  • Missing or mismatched album artwork
  • Live tracks matched to their studio versions
  • Wrong metadata
  • Albums refusing to sync

The vast majority of people's libraries shouldn't see these errors, but regardless: Before spinning up iCloud Music Library, you should make a backup of your music library. This way, in case anything goes pear-shaped, you have a place to reset.

What do I lose when I disable iCloud Music Library?

If you choose to turn off iCloud Music Library, you'll no longer have access to:

  • A cloud-based copy of your Mac's iTunes library
  • Your Mac's Matched or Uploaded tracks to stream on your other devices (if using Apple Music or iTunes Match)
  • Any saved songs from the Apple Music catalog

Even with iCloud Music Library off, however, you'll still have access to purchased iTunes content; that's always available for streaming across your devices whether you have iCloud enabled or not.

Don't want to use iCloud Music Library but still want to jam out to Apple Music? Here's how to use Apple's subscription service without it. You can also use iCloud Music Library with a secondary iTunes Library if you want to keep your primary music collection separate, but still sync some of your tunes to your other devices.

How to enable or disable iCloud Music Library

If you want to turn iCloud Music Library on or off, here's how you go about doing that.

On your iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch

  1. Open Settings.
  2. Tap Music.

  3. Tap the iCloud Music Library switch to turn it to the 'off' position.

  4. Tap Turn Off.

  5. Tap the switch again to turn on iCloud Music Library.

Update Macbook

On your Mac

  1. Open iTunes on your Mac.

  2. Click iTunes in the Menu bar.

  3. Click Preference.

  4. Click the checkbox next to iCloud Music Library to uncheck it. Python serial library mac. Click the box again to check it and turn on iCloud Music Library.

A note on iOS 13 and macOS Catalina

In Apple's upcoming iOS 13 and macOS Catalina software releases, these options work as outlined in the instructions above, except that the option is now labeled 'Sync Library' instead of iCloud Music Library, and on macOS, the process takes place in the Music app, rathar than iTunes, which is being split into separate Music, Podcasts, and TV apps.

Any other questions?

Let us know in the comments. (We've also got a bunch of iCloud Music Library troubleshooting articles available.)

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Updated August 2019: Instructions updated through macOS Mojave and iOS 12.4.

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