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Apple Music Apple Music has stopped updating song play count

jonhoy

jonhoy

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 11, 2015
120
45
I play Apple Music through my iPhone and my HomePod. On both iOS and HomePod I've toggled off/on Update Listening History (through Settings app and Home app both on my iPhone). I don't really want to turn off Sync Library on my iPhone and then turn it back on and have to download all my music again.

I'm signed into Apple Music on two Macs and both are showing the same, outdated play count. According to my Mac, the last time a song was played from my iPhone or HomePod was the morning of Oct. 25. Looking back, that's when Sonoma 14.1 released (and I'm sure that's when I updated) but I'm not sure if that has anything to do with it since my second Mac is still on Ventura 13.0 and it's showing the same play counts.

All other Apple Music functionality seems to be working. Creating a new playlist on one device gets synced across devices immediately and playback on one device is paused when I start to play on another device. It's just play count that's stopped working.

I've also updated all relevant devices to latest versions. Mac, at least one of them, is on 14.1.1, iOS is 17.1.1 and HomePod is 17.1.1.
 
Same problem here. Two days worth of play counts have vanished into the black hole that is Apple cloud services. I can manually sync from the Mac to any other devices, but not vice versa.

I've submitted feedback to Apple multiple times asking for a way to manually trigger a library sync from iOS or iPadOS.
 
Play count sync iOS <-> macOS for me stopped Oct, 25th, which happens to be the day iOS17.1 and Sonoma x.1 were released (and installed by me, of course)

One last sync so far happened a couple of days later but from tvOS -> macOS. iOS hasn't updated any counter in Apple Music ever since.
 
iTim314 said:
Same problem here. Two days worth of play counts have vanished into the black hole that is Apple cloud services. I can manually sync from the Mac to any other devices, but not vice versa.

I've submitted feedback to Apple multiple times asking for a way to manually trigger a library sync from iOS or iPadOS.
Click to expand...
Was the last recorded song play also on Oct 25?

dadudeness said:
Play count sync iOS <-> macOS for me stopped Oct, 25th, which happens to be the day iOS17.1 and Sonoma x.1 were released (and installed by me, of course)

One last sync so far happened a couple of days later but from tvOS -> macOS. iOS hasn't updated any counter in Apple Music ever since.
Click to expand...
Interesting, definitely feels like something is up with that update.
 
Unfortunately I’ve noticed this same thing, it did start when I updated my phone and computer to the latest update, this happens at least once each major apple iOS update, hopefully it’s fixed in 17.2, and hopefully the play counts do update as the last player songs are reflected on the phone
 
I use iTunes Match service and have also lost Last Played and Play Count sync. I reported it here:
I’m not sure if it was the right place to do so however.
Edit: anyone running betas of 17.2 or Sanoma 14.2?
 
Last edited:
Same here. Plays from iPhone haven't registered since Oct 21st. However, if I play a song on my MacBook whatever paly count it has overwrites the data on my phone. Similarly, if I edit a songs metadata on my MacBook it will overwrite the play counts on my phone. I even have some songs with a Last Played date, but no Play Count.
 
tex210 said:
I use iTunes Match service and have also lost Last Played and Play Count sync. I reported it here:
I’m not sure if it was the right place to do so however.
Edit: anyone running betas of 17.2 or Sanoma 14.2?
Click to expand...
If I’m not mistaken, iCloud Music Library for Apple Music and iTunes Match are effectively the same service underneath, so it doesn’t surprise me that this doesn’t work.

Those that have this issue and are running the .2 betas say it’s not resolved there either.
 
I talked to support (both chat and phone) and they did not acknowledge that it was a known issue.
 
I updated and can confirm it is indeed fixed. Newly listened tracks are syncing better than ever (less delay and more reliably). I think some of the missed history ended up syncing over, but it doesn't seem like all of it. Either way, happy it is fixed moving forward.
 
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Nice! I'm not going to download betas but I'm glad the fix is coming soon.
 
Regarding missing plays over the last month, I took screenshots of my Apple Music Replay last week and compared it to today. The plays seem to be tracking there. Hopefully these plays will eventually sync.
 
This was happening for me earlier this year, then it started counting play counts again, and just today I noticed it isn't. Another issue I have: whenever I close iTunes (it'll always be iTunes to me), my playlists are re-sorted by Album Title when I reopen them. I prefer Album by Artist/Year so I try to just leave it open ... otherwise every time I open it, I have to re-sort my newer playlists. Oddly, older ones made on previous Macs stay sorted as I prefer them.

How is it that iTunes worked better 10 years ago than it does now? I suppose they think it's an outdated idea since most people just stream ... but what about the rest of us? I'm surprised they don't seem to care.
 
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