Will moving music to an external drive create duplicates in iTunes?

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Level 1

14 points

Will moving music to an external drive create duplicates in iTunes?

Hi guys,

Recently after losing over 158GB of music (which I had either ripped from CDs or were mp3s from sources other than Apple) from iTunes when I cancelled my Match subscription it left me with only 17GB of music in iTunes. After a long argument the missing music reappeared.

learning from this experience I decided to move my library to an external drive. However this has only moved the 158GB - the other 17GB has remained on the internal drive.

Music on both internal and external drives show up no problem. However I want to move the 17GB folder onto the external drive.

Do any of you know whether doing so, will make iTunes create duplicates of this music? If it does the simple answer will probably be to erase the duplicates in iTunes. However, with 17GB, that’s going to be a heck of a lot of individual songs I’ll need to erase.

Any thoughts please?

[Re-Titled by Moderator]

Mac mini, macOS 15.3

Posted on May 10, 2025 7:30 AM

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Answer 1

May 15, 2025 2:40 AM in response to shaunmck

Response to shaunmck

Hey Shaun ,

So , you're not missing the music after canceling , you were able to get it back ?

Did you restart the subscription or are you done with it ?

Did you have the option to keep your original copies stored on your computer or have them replaced by copies from the iTunes Store ?

I'll tell you what I think ……I believe that you can keep whatever is already downloaded &

your music library is downloaded in the original computer . iTunes Match means that you tunes were replaced with a copy from the iTunes Store . I've surmised that you will create duplicates . Correct me if I'm wrong ~ I haven't used any subscription services , I included a link in the event that I'm not making sense .

Be adventurous , try it out and see . If you make duplicates , would you really have to remove them one at a time ? Check if there's an easier way .

If songs are missing from your music library after you turn on Sync Library - Apple Support

🎶

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Answer 2

shaunmck Author

Level 1

14 points

May 16, 2025 10:51 AM in response to shaunmck

Hi and thanks for your reply.

Yes I was finally able to get the vast majority of my music back - I don’t know whether this was by chance or design.

I renewed my Match subscription and the next day everything was back.

What irks me is that I should not have needed to restart the subscription in order to access my own files once more. And also I have no assurances that music will disappear again in a year’s time when I don’t resubscribe to Match once again.

To try to ensure the same thing cannot happen again I’ve moved my whole library to an external drive and backed these contents up through Time Machine to another external drive whilst also doing a manual backup to a third external drive. I’m hoping this approach will prevent the same problem reoccurring next year.

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Answer 3

May 16, 2025 3:50 PM in response to shaunmck

Reply to shaunmck

This is how I have explained it to Apple Music users … … think of it as " renting a music library " , any interruption of the subscription results in empty libraries .

Like if you rent a place to live and don't pay , you lose it .

💯 Here's your assurance : the music will disappear again if you don't continue your subscription .

🎸 🎹 🥁

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