Apple books not displaying correct cover art on iPhone, shows correct on MacBook pro.

Question

Level 1

15 points

Apple books not displaying correct cover art on iPhone, shows correct on MacBook pro.

Keep all my audiobooks on MacBook pro, keep a smaller number that I'm listening to now on iPhone 17. Cover art shows correctly on MacBook Pro but when syncing new audiobooks via Finder on to iPhone, the cover art is not correct for the book playing or is even from a music album. When re-do the sync, get a different cover art than what was seen before. Had same problem on prior iOS as well (now on 26). The audiobooks that were already on iPhone that were transferred directly from iPhone 15 now show correctly.

Suggestions?

iPhone 17 Pro Max

Posted on Oct 11, 2025 1:57 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Steve A.

Level 3

724 points

Nov 9, 2025 6:33 AM in response to NWGuy

Just experienced this as well, after going to iOS 26.1 from 18.7.2. (was trying to hold out for a while but my Apple Watch died - the new Series 11 watches sold require iOS 26...) In my case, the audiobook had a random podcast cover art.

I noticed over the years that this bug rears its ugly head during every iOS version change. The best thing to do is submit a bug report (albeit periodically) via Apple Feedback:

https://www.apple.com/feedback/books-ios-ipados/

Until Engineering picks this up on their radar, there is nothing we can do but wait until an iOS point update comes through.

**UPDATE**

Try deleting the troublesome audiobook via the Finder (via Manage Storage...) and then add that book again to the iPhone. The second time I transferred, the sync time (spinning gears) took about a minute less to complete, and I watched the errant artwork change to the correct audiobook cover art.

Not saying that there isn't a bug present, per se... just that this could be a temporary workaround.

Steve

Reply