How to Sync Music from a Mac to iPhone or iPad Using iTunes (macOS Mojave or Earlier)

Step-by-step guide to syncing music from a Mac running macOS Mojave or earlier using iTunes. For Catalina and later, see the Finder guide.

If your Mac is running macOS Mojave (10.14) or earlier, device syncing still happens inside iTunes. This guide covers that flow.

Running macOS Catalina or later? iTunes has been replaced by Finder-based syncing. See How to Sync Music from a Mac (macOS Catalina or Later).

What you’ll need

• A Mac running macOS Mojave (10.14) or earlier with iTunes installed
• Your iPhone or iPad
• A Lightning cable
• Music already in your iTunes library

Step-by-step

1. Open iTunes and connect your device

Plug the device in. On the device, tap Trust and enter your passcode if prompted.

2. Click the device icon

A small device icon appears near the top-left of iTunes, below the playback controls. Click it.

3. Click “Music” in the sidebar

In the left sidebar under your device’s name, click Music.

4. Enable syncing

Tick Sync Music.

Then choose:

• Entire music library — syncs everything in iTunes to the device.
• Selected playlists, artists, albums, and genres — pick only what you want.

5. Click Apply (or Sync)

Bottom right, click Apply. If it doesn’t start automatically, click Sync.

Enable Wi-Fi sync

In the device’s Summary tab:

1. Scroll to Options.
2. Tick Sync with this iPhone over Wi-Fi.
3. Click Apply.

The device will appear in iTunes automatically when it’s on the same Wi-Fi as the Mac and plugged into power.

After syncing

Open Stezza on your device. Your synced music appears automatically — Stezza reads from your device’s Music library.

If the library looks empty, see My Music Library Looks Empty in Stezza.

Consider upgrading

macOS Mojave is well past end-of-support at this point. If your Mac supports a newer macOS, upgrading gets you newer features and security updates. The sync flow changes to Finder-based (see the Catalina+ guide) but is functionally similar.

Related Guides