Aug 12,2019 • Filed to: iTunes Music Transfer • Proven solutions
Do you want to learn how to purchase music on iTunes? This might seem fairly intuitive, but it can actually get pretty confusing. Especially when you take into account the strong lockdown that iTunes has on their assets (be it their music, apps, videos, etc.) No matter, we’re going to be breaking down the simplest and most straight forward way of purchasing music on iTunes — complete with a breakdown on what you’re going to need before you purchase it as well as a couple of tips and tricks that you might want to know when it comes to managing your purchased iTunes music!
Before we break the process down step-by-step (pictures included), let’s start by discussing what you’re going to need in order to be able to purchase music on iTunes.
- To start, you’ll need an iTunes Account. You can create one of these on their website, your iOS device, or the iTunes software on your Mac/PC.
- Make sure to set up this account with Payment Details (be it your credit card, PayPal, etc.) as iTunes will be asking you to confirm your details for your first purchase — with a text confirmation to the primary contact connected to whatever choice of payment you apply for your account.
- Specifically, for our tutorial below (since we’re going to be teaching you through the iTunes software — rather than the app or their website), you’re going to need a version of iTunes installed on your MAC/PC.
This is the basic gist of what you’ll need to have prepared before being able to go through our tutorial below, so make sure you have these things handled (or else you’ll be very confused at the start.)
Now, we’re going to actually start our how to purchase music on iTunes tutorial! Again, we’re going to be using the desktop version of iTunes for this breakdown. Have it launched in order to start, and you should be able to follow along from there!
Steps to Purchase Music on iTunes
Step 1 — Music > Store
On the iTunes main toolbar, you’ll see that they have a dedicated dropdown menu [1] that separates their assets: Music, Podcasts, Apps, etc.
- Make sure that you have Music selected.
- And then, select the Store option [2] in order to directly access the iTunes Music store (which we have shown in the image below.)
Step 2 — Browse
On the iTunes Music store, you can browse for music in a couple of different ways. Either you use the search bar (at the top right-hand corner of the screen) or you take advantage of the interface by searching relevant tags (New Music, Features, Pop, Country, K-pop, etc.)
Once you’ve found the album/track that you want to download select it, in order to proceed.
Step 3 — Buy!
If you’ve selected an album, then the page should look a bit like this. Here, you can:
-
1.
- Buy the entire album for a discounted price. 2.
- OR buy tracks in the albums separately.
Either way, you should still be prompted with the same message shown in Step 4.
Step 4 — Sign-In Required
In the very first part of this article, the first thing on our list of ‘things you need to have prepared’ was an iTunes account. That’s because you’ll be prompted to use it now. A sign-in window will appear (shown below), prompting you to input your account details.
Once you’ve signed in, click the Buy button and another message will appear on your screen (shown below), you’ll need to click the Buy option a second time in order to confirm your purchase.
Step 5 — Download!
After clicking the Buy option, the album that you purchased should now begin to download automatically. You can view the progress of your downloads by clicking the Download icon at the top right-hand corner of the screen.
What are the most common issues that might occur when you buy songs from iTunes? Well, there are a couple of things that might end up causing you problems. Among these, are the following
- Misplaced Purchase: Recently, iTunes has had issues with its sorting feature — causing certain purchases to be stored in other libraries. If you can’t find your purchase in the music folder, check the recently added library on iTunes.
- Purchase Deleted: If you accidentally deleted your purchased songs, then there is a way of getting it back (iTunes has an option that will allow you to transfer purchases.)
- Account Lost: A lot of this depends on the fact that you have a singular account with iTunes. However, there are some that might end up losing access to their iTunes account. In these times, there’s no real method of retrieving your songs (unless you have an available iTunes backup on your PC or phone — and use another program to restore them.)
- Purchase Not Received: If you get the wrong purchase, in general, then there is a way of reporting it to iTunes (on your mobile device, the apple website, etc.)
- Purchase Lost: If your purchase is just plain lost, and you can’t use the iTunes report feature, then we once again recommend using an old backup in order to restore them.)
For this part, we’re going to be giving you another tutorial. This time, on a popular transfer software that you can use (in replacement of iTunes) in order to manage all the content on your iTunes library. That is iMusic . Why would you choose this over just using iTunes? We’ve listed a couple of its main features below, but the basic gist is — it’s easier to use, and it’s very flexible in terms of options and tools.
iMusic - All-in-one Music Management Tools to Manage Your Purchased Songs from iTunes
- Great library feature that connects directly to your iTunes (or your connected device’s) library. This library feature will allow you to change ID3 tags, add/delete songs, manually transfer songs, etc.
- It can also be used for downloading songs from YouTube and other sources (which is great when you end up losing your data without backup.)
- Backing up and restoring data is easy with iMusic as well — with manual backups, automatic backups, full restore options, etc.
- Easily transfer the contents of your iTunes library to a device (iOS/Android) and vice versa (Mac/PC.)
- Intuitive and sleek interface — FREE trial is available if you want to follow along as we explore it down below.
Guide to Manage All songs Purchased from iTunes by iMusic Easily
Step 1 — iTunes Library
When you first launch the iMusic software, you’ll be on the Get Music tab (1), this is where you can download/record music or videos from popular websites: including YouTube, Soundcloud, etc. There are other four tabs to discover, for Step 2, we’re going to be moving to the second tab, which is the iTunes Library tab (2.)
Step 2 — iTunes Library
Under the iTunes library tab, you can see all that’s in your iTunes library. Primarily, you’ll be on the music page — but you can also explore the playlist, videos, podcasts, download, etc. pages by clicking on their respective icons from the top-left hand corner of the screen.
Step 3 — Edit Music Info
If you want to edit your purchase music’s ID3 tags, then you can do so easily by right-clicking on the song you want to edit and then selecting the Edit Music Info option from the drop-down menu.
Clicking the ‘Edit Music Info’ button will prompt a sidebar to appear on the right side of your screen. Here, you can change the following:
- Cover Art
- Song Name
- Artist Name
- Album Name
- Genre (drop-down menu available)
After making the changes that you want to make, simply click the Save button in order to save whatever changes you’ve made thus far.
Step 4 — Device
If you want, you can also transfer your iTunes music to a device (or vice versa.) The options for this are available under the Device tab. Outside of the transfer options, you can also use this in order to manage your device’s library.
Step 5 — Toolbox
The final tab is the Toolbox tab. This is, to put it simply, where all of iMusic’s extra features are located. Be it the rebuild library option, clean up iTunes library option, backup/restore iTunes option, remove DRM option, and so much more!
How else can you use iMusic in order to help? If you remember, in the list of problems that we had in part three, we suggested multiple times that you make use of an iTunes backup or even your cellular device in order to fully restore your iTunes library! Well, that’s what we’re going to be showing you with iMusic below. Specifically, how you can rebuild your iTunes library with your device’s available media library (although you can also use the restore/backup option we introduced under the Toolbox tab.)
How to Fix iTunes Problems by iMusic
Step 1 — Switch to iTunes Plug-In
The first thing that you have to do, is toggle on the iTunes Plug-In option (available at the top right corner of the screen — marked in the image below.)
Step 2— Rebuild iTunes Library
When the iMusic iTunes plug-in is toggled on, your window should look like this — refer to the image below. Here is where you can use the Rebuild iTunes Library option! For this to work, you also need to have a device connected that you can use in order to restore your iTunes library (preferably, with all the songs that you are missing.)
Step 3— Start
iMusic will automatically detect all the differences between your device and your iTunes library — and will rebuild from there (nothing will be deleted — unlike with iTunes, which has a tendency of deleting your content when you use its sync feature.) To start rebuilding, click the Start button and wait for your content to be transferred!
Conclusion: And that is how you purchase iTunes music! Hopefully, we were able to teach you a couple of tips and tricks that you can take with you in order to make your experience more stress-free. Of course, we recommend that you try out the iMusic software — which, as we demonstrated can be very helpful when it comes to fixing your issues and managing your iTunes library overall! Remember, there’s a FREE trial available if you want to try it out and explore its features!
Adam Cash
staff Editor
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