I have lost numerous audiobooks after the… (2025)

Moozito

User level: Community Specialist

Hello Alloyd1,

Thank you for using Apple Support Communities! I understand that certain audiobooks are no longer showing in the Apple Books Library on your iPad. You've come to the right place for help.

Let's start by confirming if you can see and redownload the missing audiobooks from My Purchases:

Redownload apps, music, movies, TV shows, and books from the App Store, iTunes Store, and Apple Books - Apple Support

Specifically, follow the steps in this section:

Redownload books or audiobooks

You can redownload books in Apple Books on an iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, or Mac. You can redownload audiobooks in Apple Books on an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch; or in iTunes on a Mac or PC.

On an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch

1. Open the Apple Books app.
2. Tap or your photo in the upper-right corner of the screen.
3. Depending on what you want to redownload, tap Books or Audiobooks under My Purchases.
4. Tap "Not on this [device]," then tap All Books or All Audiobooks.
5. Find the book or audiobook that you want to download, then tap . The item downloads to your device. Don't see the item that you purchased?
   

If the audiobooks do not appear under My Purchases, and they are not hidden, can you confirm if these were purchased from Apple Books or another source?

Cheers!

alain2019

4 points

I tried a bunch of fixes found on the internet and none of them work. The audiobooks still show up in iTune "in My Device" but they cannot be reach in the iphone.

The biggest problem is that they use flash memory in the iphone and they won't get away. I have now 7.2 GB of unknown data on a 32GB phone...

[Edited by Host]

devonhub

19 points

Similar problem experienced after updating my wife's iPhone to iOS 12.1.1. She's listens to audiobooks that she syncs from iTunes on her iMac. She's been following the same routine from early days with her iPods ... manually select audiobooks she wants to listen to, sync to her phone, listen to books, rinse, repeat. After updating to 12.1.1, on multiple instances she has finished listening to all tracks of an audio book and she goes back to her library [on her iPhone] to start a new book and all other books are gone. When she physically connects her iPhone to her iMac to re-sync with iTunes, all the missing audiobooks show as still selected in her iTunes:iPhone Sync Audiobooks list. look at "On My Device:Audiobook", all the expected books are shown as present on the device. But they're definitely not available from the iBooks.app on the iPhone. She tries to sync, and none of those books re-appear on her iPhone.

The only way we've been able to resync audiobooks is to disabled 'Sync Audiobooks' in iTunes, sync to clear audiobook selections entirely from the iPhone, re-enable 'Sync Audiobooks' and then sync again. All the selected audiobooks then show up back on her iPhone ... only to disappear again after she completes listening to an audiobook.

As noted above, she's never had this problem syncing and listening to audiobooks since first starting with iPods. This problem just started after upgrading her iPhone to 12.1.1. Her iPhone was previously running iOS 12.1.0.

[ reported as radar bug #46764078 ]

trey240

4 points

Try searching the search bar when you drag down. I put a ton of lectures on my iphone X and Books and Music tell me they down exist. If I search for them, then they show up in search results. Click them to play and got to "Reading Now". Add it to a collection and then it will show up in the Audiobooks help.

Not saying this is acceptable, but its the only way I've found to access material thats outside the apple stores - a problem that keeps getting worse.

zydecho

4 points

I can verify this.

In my situation, I have audiobooks I've collected by various means - purchased, converted, downloaded,... I went into itunes and double checked that all the file formats are m4b and the file media type is "audiobook". The genre is "lecture" (...I may try changing that to "audiobook" in case that's the bug.) When I review the left nav under device, I can see that all the files I want are on the device and are under "audiobooks" - I'd check that.

So my files should be on the phone, but they are not to be found via Books (or Music) and the search returns nothing. HOWEVER, if you do a phone search (exact match) I can see my audiobook in those search results under "Books". I can then click on the result and viola, I have the book playing in Books. This book will eventually how up in "Reading Now" and when it does I can nab it by tagging it into a collection. Once in a collection, you can access the audiobook.

alain2019

4 points

I have exactly the same problem and the worse part is that all these books that are disappearing are still in memory in the Iphone but cannot be deleted. If you look at Iphone Storage they appear as "Other". It's a nightmare, we can only have one book at the time. How can Apple make such an incredible bug and do nothing about it.

I'm very very angry at Apple right now!

zootgirl

8 points

I’m in the same boat as your wife. Just finished a book only to discover my whole library is gone. Pulling down to search finds the audiobooks that were once there, but clicking on them just brings up my empty library. Very annoying.

I suppose this won’t get fixed until the next update(s). Hopefully anyways.

Were you able to find a fix? Or, is only putting one audiobook on my phone at a time the stop-gap for now?

John Galloway

71 points

Same problem here. First the audiobook titles (all from Audible) showed up, but would not play (I was in airplane mode at the time). Then when getting out of airplane mode, my iPhone 6 (IOS 12.1.2) shows no audiobooks, despite iTunes showing them all and claiming it synced them to my phone. Unbelievably annoying. I got past it my using the Audible app instead of Apple's book App, though it had to redownload everything. so now they are likely there twice with one copy hidden in some way just taking up space.

Tim Cook lowers forecasts of iPhone sales and says it's due to fewer upgrades from battery replacements, China's slowdown and trade tensions with China. Of course it could not possibly be that folks are becoming fed up with the ever growing list of sw problems.

It used to be that this sort of thing didn't happen (at least often) as Apple controlled all the software. Now it happens because Apple wants to control if not provide all the content too. What a surprise that this issue doesn't happen for books purchased from Apple.

alain2019

4 points

More problems:

Yesterday I try to put back one audiobook with iTune and this time it didn't show up on Book at all. Tried a coulpe of time to re-sync, still not there, I did try another Audio app (but not Audible) without success. The funny part is that they show up on "On My Device" and I can even play them from iTune. So iTune can play audiobooks from my iPhone, but not my iPhone. Yes it's 2019, technology is going forward, or is it?

Workaround:

I changed the status of the audiobook to music (via get info with a right click on the book) and synced it as a music album and it worked, so now I'm using the music player to listen to my audiobooks. It's better than nothing.

My kids are using an other brand of telephone (you can guess which one) with another OS that start with andr.... They laugh at me and ask me why I'm still using an iPhone. I have no answer to that.

GizzyGirlUSA

4 points

One other problem, whenever I sync with iTunes it attempts to upddate to ios 12.1.2. I have already updated to ios 12.1.2 with the iPhone. Not sure if this is an iTunes problem or an iPhone problem.

Has anyone else seen this problem with iTunes?

alain2019

4 points

Same problem for me, so I let iTune re-installed ios 12.1.2 to get rid of the message and I got errors a couple of time but it did re-installed ios 12.1.2 eventually... for no good. It didn't fix the problem with audiobooks. It seems that all good the developers at Apple have left.

I'm working in a software company and we would never release such a OS where the basic features have obviously not been verified nor validated.

Amateurs work.

ClaudiafrCo

8 points

Same experience as devonhub - though with my iPod Touch.

I've synced through iTunes after making sure the audios are in my Audiobooks library in iTunes, then either drag and drop or right-click "add to device" or Sync Selected in the general sync instructions once iPod Touch connected (and btw, have to re-select "manually manage music and videos" every time with iPod in Summary - keeps changing back with latest 12.1.1 update). This always worked before.

Now, it looks as if the audiobooks are "On My Device" before I disconnect, and indeed, icons show up in the Library, but when I click/tap on them on the iPod in an attempt to listen - crickets! Then when I tap the 3 dots, lower right on icon, hoping for a PLAY NOW, only options offered are Delete, remove from want to read, add to collection, mark as finished or share audiobook (and just how would THAT happen??)

So, I add to both Want To Read and My Books, hoping this is magic step. Go to Want to Read and yes, there is the Listen button; again, tapping that - crickets. When I go to same book in My Books and tap, again nothing. Each place holder has those cute little 3 dots that look as if they'll have all the options, but PLAY or LISTEN or PLAY NOW is never there.

I HATE the upgrade 12.1.1 if that's what causing this.

Alexroet

422 points

mastmann

4 points

zootgirl

8 points

I’ve just been loading one audiobook at a time. Annoying, yes. But, until they fix the issue it’s the only way I can see to keep listening. 😕

I’ve tried using the Audible app to listen to books, but it doesn’t seem to like books I’ve ripped myself.