Lost access to my ripped music on iOS Music after ending subscription.

Question

Level 1

8 points

Lost access to my ripped music on iOS Music after ending subscription.

I have ripped a number of CDs that I own onto my MacBook. The music files are visible and playable on the MacBook. For years I was able to sync those files onto my iPhones and listen to them with Music on the the phone. A few months ago I started a subscription to Music. I then cancelled that subscription and I now seem to be unable to access my owned music through the app. I can access music that I purchased years ago from Apple, but when I try to sync my ripped songs from the MacBook to the iPhone it doesn't work. The iPhone shows that the music is there, but when I try to play it I can't.

By subscribing to Music and then cancelling have I bricked the app for playing the ripped files?

(please excuse any misuse of terminology).

Thank you community for helping me with this. I miss my music.

(I am running OS 14.6.1 on the MacBook and 18.5 on a 3rd Gen SE.)

iPhone SE, iOS 18

Posted on Jul 4, 2025 05:02 AM

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Answer 1

Jul 4, 2025 06:16 AM in response to Chargerny

Are you trying to do cloud-based synchronization or manual synchronization?

For cloud-based synchronization of music from your own CDs, you need to be a subscriber to Apple Music or to iTunes Match. And at least with Apple Music, when the subscription ends, all of the synchronized copies may go away with it – leaving only the original copies you had before taking out the subscription.

If you are doing manual synchronization (with Finder and a cable), that should work without a subscription. Thus, assuming that the music that you purchased on CD still exists on your Mac (but no longer exists on your iPhone), you should be able to use Finder and a cable to load the music back onto the iPhone.

If that is not working, I would suggest doing a synchronization where you have NO music selected (hopefully this will wipe all music off the iPhone), followed by another synchronization with the desired selection. (The idea here being to ensure that the system is loading fresh copies of the music onto the iPhone, and not accidentally reusing Sync Library copies that might no longer be useful because of the end of the subscription.)

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Answer 2

Chargerny Author

Level 1

8 points

Jul 4, 2025 08:51 AM in response to Servant of Cats

Thank you so very much.

I was attempting to sync manually (with cable).

I followed your suggestion to sync to no music and then resync with the ripped files. It worked!!

I'm very happy. I sincerely appreciate your knowledge and your willingness to share it.

Have a great day.

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