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Can't see my transferred music in YouTube Music

Thomas
  • Updated
YOUTUBE MUSIC
Your likes became a playlist, your artists a subscription
Nothing here lands where you would expect. Here is the map, and the setting that hides a whole transfer.

Where each transfer lands

YouTube Music files each kind of content in its own place, and two of the four are not in your library at all. This is why a finished transfer can leave your library looking untouched.

What you transferred Where to look
A playlist, with its tracks Library › Playlists
Favorite tracks, liked or loved songs The Liked Music playlist
Favorite albums, saved releases Library › Albums
Favorite artists, followed acts Subscriptions
Artists live in Subscriptions, not in the Artists tab
The Artists tab shows acts pulled from the music you saved. The ones you follow sit under Subscriptions, which is where a transfer of favorite artists arrives. Sorting that list A to Z is the quickest way to spot them all.

Try these in order

  1. Open the web player first
    Go to your library on the web and check the four places above. If your music is there, the transfer worked and your app is showing an old copy.
  2. Check which channel you are on
    This one is specific to YouTube. A single Google account can carry several channels, and each has its own library. If you connected one channel here and browse another in the app, your transfer is sitting in the one you are not looking at.
  3. Turn on Show your liked music from YouTube
    YouTube and YouTube Music share one account and two sets of likes. With that setting off, songs liked on the YouTube side stay hidden in YouTube Music, and a transfer of favorites looks like it never happened.
  4. Force the app to refresh
    The app keeps a local copy of your library so it opens quickly. Sign out and back in, or clear the cache from the app settings, and it rebuilds from your account.
Videos and songs share the same likes
Because the two services were merged, a liked music video and a liked song end up in the same pile. Connecting YouTube Music rather than YouTube is what keeps a transfer to audio only.

Frequently Asked Questions

I transferred artists and my Artists tab is unchanged.

Open Subscriptions instead, that is where followed artists go. The Artists tab is built from the albums and songs you saved, so it only fills up when you transfer those.

I transferred my liked songs. Where is the playlist?

There is one, and YouTube Music made it for you. It is called Liked Music and it sits with your other playlists, filling up with every song you like.

Everything shows on the web but my phone is empty.

Then the transfer is done and the app is holding an old copy. Sign out and back in, and check on the way that both are on the same channel.

Some albums never arrived. Why those?

Not every release can be saved to a library from outside the app, and the catalog also changes from one country to the next. Those two together explain the albums that stay behind.

Checked all four places and still nothing?
Tell us what you transferred and when. Then say whether it shows on the web player, because that is the detail that tells us where to look.

Contact Support

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