How to transfer music from iPhone to iTunes or the Apple Music app

iTunes is good at syncing music to your iPhone, but not in the other direction. Learn how to transfer songs from iPhone to iTunes or the Music app for newer macOS.

Quick to know:

• You can easily download purchased songs and transfer music from your iPhone to iTunes to enlarge your iTunes music library on computer. But what about the non-purchased tracks?
• The efficient tool iPhone Data Transfer gives you quick options of transferring iPhone music to iTunes, whether for songs, playlists, albums, or other soundtracks on your iPhone.
• No matter you want to move music from iPhone to iTunes to create a backup of your iPhone music, rebuild iTunes music library locally, or free up device space, there are ways on the go.

It's a straightforward process to transfer music from iPhone to iTunes within the app or using a 3rd-party program.

If you're a music addict, you probably have a remarkable music collection on your iPhone, iPad or iPod. While you can listen to all of them on the go, you might want to export some of tracks and transfer music from iPhone to iTunes for desktop play, or rebuild the local iTunes library or make a copy of iPhone music backup on computer.

While iTunes offers you its own music transfer feature that lets you transfer purchased music from iPhone to iTunes for local playback with clicks, unfortunately, your common music files are not n the list. To transfer music from an iPhone to iTunes and move the non-purchased tracks, you'll need some help of alternative music transferring tool for iOS to get it done.

In this post, we'll share the most convenient ways for transferring iPhone music to iTunes. Keep reading to see how to transfer music from iPhone to iTunes step by step.

Table of Contents

• How to transfer music from iPhone to iTunes directly (Purchased songs only)
• How to transfer songs from iPhone to iTunes on PC & Mac
• One-click to transfer iPhone music to iTunes
• Bonus: Transfer music from iTunes to iPhone directly

How to transfer music from iPhone to iTunes directly - Purchased songs

If you're looking for the easiest way to transfer music from your iPhone to iTunes, the good news is that you can complete the whole process within the iTunes app.

Compatible with macOS 10.14 Mojave or earlier or a Windows PC, iTunes allows you to collect and manage your favorite tracks in one place. Additionally, it has its own music transfer feature that makes it easy to move music from your iPhone to iTunes for free, which includes your purchases like songs, playlists and albums, but not non-purchased music.

How to transfer songs from iPhone to iTunes within the app:

1. Authorize this computer

• Open iTunes and update it to the latest version.
• Head to Account > Authorizations > Authorize This Computer from the top menu.
• When prompted, enter your Apple ID and password as required.
• Click Authorize to go on.

Before downloading purchased songs to iTunes, authorizing the computer is necessary.

2. Attach iPhone to computer.

• Connect your iOS device to your computer with a USB cable.
• If asked, select Trust to trust this computer. You'll see a phone icon appear at the top-left corner when it's really connected.

3. Put music from iPhone to iTunes.

• From the menu bar at the top of the iTunes window, go to File > Devices.
• Select Transfer Purchases from [Your device].

It's a quick way to transfer iPhone music to local iTunes library.

Note: You will need to authorize the computer for several times if your songs or albums were bought with several different accounts.

How to transfer songs from iPhone to iTunes on PC & Mac - Non-purchased songs

Anytime you want to transfer your iPhone music to iTunes or computer, the two-way file transferring tool iPhone Data Transfer is a reliable solution that provides the power to manage your iPhone media content and transfer non-purchased music from iPhone to iTunes, PC, Mac or vice versa.

Aside from transferring playlists from iPhone to iTunes, this program lets you one-click to backup iPhone music, rebuild iTunes library, and transfer all songs from iPhone to computer seamlessly. Supporting all iDevices and iOS versions, it requires only 3 simple steps to move your music on iPhone to iTunes: connect iPhone, select multiple or all music files, and make music transfer.

Here're the steps to export iPhone music to iTunes in a flexible and efficient way:

Step 1: Plug in your iPhone to PC or Mac

To transfer music files to iTunes library, connect your iPhone with your Windows PC or Mac and open the software. If required, follow your iPhone's onscreen instructions to trust your computer.

Step 2: Select your music files from library

Click the Music tab on the left sidebar to get into your iPhone music library. It will quickly load all your tracks and playlists within seconds, allowing to select all music files or specific tracks that you want to transfer to iTunes.

Step 3: Start moving your songs to iTunes

After selection, start copying iPhone music to iTunes library by clicking the computer icon at the top toolbar and selecting Export to iTunes from drop-down menu.

Alternatively, right-click the playlists you desire in Playlist section and choose Export to iTunes option from the expanded menu.

That's it! A small window will open, indicating the progress of the music transfer. Once it's done, all the transferred tracks should appear in Songs tab in iTunes library.

The steps for putting songs from iPhone to iTunes are almost the same on a Mac, but you will want to click Export to Music button here instead if you're having a machine with macOS 10.15 and later version, which replaces iTunes with Apple Music app for desktop music playback.

Tip:

• If a playlist is already existing in the iTunes library, iPhone Data Transfer takes all of the songs from the playlist on iPhone and add them to the same playlist in your iTunes. Otherwise, it will create a new playlist locally.

Extra tip: Video tutorial for iPhone music transfer to iTunes:

• 00:03: Intro
• 00:23: Transfer Purchases from iPhone to iTunes
• 01:32: Transfer iPhone Music to iTunes via Third-party Tool
• 02:28: One-click Shortcut to Move music from iPhone to iTunes directly

One-click to transfer iPhone music to iTunes

The default and most common approach of importing songs and playlists from iPhone to iTunes is by choosing what you want from the music library. Also, you can one-click to move your music to iTunes just by a shortcut built in iPhone Data Transfer. This is especially helpful if your iTunes library is corrupted or emptied after an iOS update/ crash, or you just want to build a new library in iTunes.

Steps on copying music from iPhone to iTunes with single click

1. After installing iPhone Data Transfer on your computer, run it. Then connect your device.

2. In its main screen, go to bottom One-click Operation section and click iTunes Library.

3. On the next screen, select "Sync Device to iTunes" tab.

4. Next, you will get a window with all types of your tracks selected by default, such as music, ringtone, audiobooks, movies, TV shows, podcasts, music videos, voice memos, playlists and iTunes U. You can uncheck the specific box related the type of track you don't need manually.

5. Press "One-Click to iTunes" button at the bottom, and let the iPhone Data Transfer transfers your iPhone tracks to iTunes on computer. Depending on how many files you're moving, this may take anything from a few minutes to hours.

Also see: How to access iTunes backup

Bonus: Transfer music from iTunes to iPhone directly

iPhone Data Transfer is excel at iPhone to iTunes music transfer when you want to download some songs or your entire media collection. It makes it easy to sync music from your computer to your iPhone without iTunes and get music from your old iPhone to a new iDevice as well.

The whole process of syncing music to iPhone is simple and straightforward.

1. Launch the application on your computer and plug your phone using a working cable.

2. Click Music tab on the left sidebar of the interface.

3. Click the + icon in the toolbar at the top of the right pane.

4. In the dialog box that opens, locate your music files or a folder from your computer, then click Open. If you select a folder, all songs inside it will be imported to your iPhone soon.

5. Wait for your music to transfer to iPhone.

If you're looking for transfer songs from one iPhone to another, check out the Export to device feature next to + button.

Conclusion

Whether you 'd like to transfer music from your iPhone to iTunes, or export iTunes music to your iPhone, you can complete the tasks easily through iTunes' own transferring feature. Or you may a more efficient iOS data transferring tool like iPhone Data Transfer which helps with two-way music transfer between iPhone and iTunes or computer effortlessly.