Fix for “No Content” on iPhone & iPod after iOS 4.2.1 update
Some users are reporting that their song and media library has disappeared after downloading iOS 4.2.1 and installing the update. You’ll know you’re effected because instead of your typical iPod music library loading in the iPod app, you’ll get a message that says “No Content” and telling you to download music from iTunes.
Fix the “No Content” after iOS 4.2.1 update bug
One of our commenters has found an even easier fix for the “No Content” bug with iOS 4.2.1 update:
- Tap on “Settings” and then on “General” and then on “International”
- Change your Language to another option, for example if your default is English, change it to Francais
- Relaunch the iPod app and wait for the iPod library to update
- Your music has returned, navigate back to Language settings and revert back to English (or your default)
Thank you to Griga for the iOS based solution! No syncing required with this method.
Here’s the original fix for the “No Content” bug: what you do to make your music and media content reappear:
- Disconnect your iPhone or iPod from your computer and then reconnect it again
- Select your device in iTunes
- Select Music and start playing a song from iTunes
- Sync your iPhone as usual
- Launch the iPod app, your music should appear
If your music and media library have not reappeared then try the process again, it should work.
This is an interesting bug and it certainly isn’t effecting everyone who updates to iOS 4.2.1, there doesn’t seem to be any particular iPhone or iPod touch that is effected either. Hat tip to TechCrunch for finding the sync solution.
Did the language switch and all my music came back! almost lost years of added music that isnt backed up anywhere! Thanks!
I was so frustrated when I “Lost content” and have tried everything to reboot it on my ipod.Googled it tonight and was very very sceptial at resetting to French then back to English but it has worked!!!! I can’t believe it was so straight forward!! Thank you sooooo much!!!!! I can now listen to the albums I downloaded last night!
Changing the language worked, changed to British English, restarted Ipod touch, but the songs and videos didn’t return until I had changed the language back to English again. Funny the instructions say “no syncing required,” followed by step #4: “Sync your iPhone”
The first fix worked for me.
I suddenly and inexplicably lost my album artwork display when I tilted my ipod5 lengthwise. Used the suggested fix to change languages in settings and Voila! my artwork came back.
Thx
language switch didn’t work for me , but the default setting for the device in itunes..devices on the host Pc was set to disabled, switched that and whoopy-do.
Dont like the itunes 11.0.2.26. can I get the old one back thatI had about a year ago?
if you do the second suggestion, for me my music finally did come up after awhile (the sync emblem was showing in my notifications on my ipod) but if i selected a song it skipped through the entire playlist, each one popped up real quick one right after the other. after the sync emblem went away i was able to play it, just an fyi for anyone who had that problem, dont do anything and wait for it to get done syncing
My problem is that it will only sync one song from my entire library and none of the solutions above will work for me. I do still have my nano, but I just spent over €200 o this Ipod touch and would like it to work. Can anyone help me?
Extremely disappointed in this ipod touch. And in Apple. Shame on you. Reading through this thread and seeing how long this has been a problem, it’s disgraceful that customers are subjected to this amount of frustration. Changing the language? Really? That didn’t work. And neither did the 2nd and 3rd and 4th…tried just about every suggestion in this thread b4 randomly hitting on the right combination of steps, not sure I’ll even remember what finally worked…piece of crap…
Really EF’n disappointed that this is the 3rd time this has happened to my ipod touch 4th gen since the release of ios6. I’m now resyncing over 4000 songs because I too got the no content thing. The odd thing was, right before this occured, in iTunes a message popped up stating something like ‘”settings changed on *ipod touch name* would you like to sync”
Since I hadn’t made any changes, I chose no or cancel (can’t quite recall the wording). And oddly, Itunes shows my Ipod having all my music, the sync box is checked as well as playlists I sync daily. I try syncing, the summary bar moves up and at the end drops down? wtf?
I just uncheked the sync in music, hit the sync button to truly remove the music then recheck the box and sync again. This is where I’m not, syncing 4K songs!
I swear, Apple is on the decline. I never had so many problems with this company as I’ve had in the 12mos since SJ passed.
Had I known this tip in advance I would have tried it. But I hope I never have to go through this again!
Thanks very much, worked perfectly! I nearly had a heart attack when I thought I had lost all of my music, thank you to the people who posted this.
Unfortunately music is still “no content” after changing the language and playing a song from my Device on iTunes. Also, I regret buying an iphone. I am trying to find some other solutions now.
Heheheheh, it worked ! Thankyou so much xD
Apple, kiss my a$$
I was going to play my music today on my Iphone. I also have “No Content.” This is ridiculous. I have many friends that do not want an IPhone because of having to use Itunes. I am beginning to agree with them. All my music is on my PC in Itunes. I have synched many times – nothing!! WHAT A HASSLE!!
Tried the solutions above and more. Tried restoring the iPod and backing it up, restoring and not using a back up, tried combining the two methods above and nada. Nothing’s working… hmmm…
I have a itouch 5.1 and none of those fixes worked. After the update, my music showed up in iTunes but not on my device. After trying all of the above I eventually plugged in my iTouch. After it synced, on the iTunes page I dragged the music folder into my iTouch/device folder. All the music copied (it took awhile) and synced successfully to my iTouch. I had to repeat the same steps with my playlist folders to have them show. I don’t know if it will automatically update, but at least I have my music back and it will play albums, etc.
HELP!! this has not worked…first i had to restore because my ipod couldnt connect to itunes… then once i restore it connects but this happens to me… now ive synced the music like 10 times and it still magically dissappears.. i tried everything from just changing language, to playing a song on itunes then syncing to restoring completely again… someone please help me
Did you figure it out? Nothing, serously, is helping. It says there are 0 songs on the ipod. Really annoying!!
Same problem with losing songs,-I can’t even find the ipod app? Have tried all fixes and nothing works! I have supported Apple since it’s inception and paid the premium $ to support the Mac-but I am getting tired of bugs that Apple must be aware of and is doing absolutely F.A
THANK YOU!
I was just about to restore my iPhone!
thank you thank you thank you
[…] test this because I found it only this morning before writing this post. It’s a tip posted by OS X Daily and it seems to have worked for some […]
i am going through the same thing and i have tried everything.
I updated to 4.2 last night and it wiped out all of my music and videos. I’ve tried the langauage trick with no luck. I’ve synched so many times I’ve lost count.
I manually managed my music so I’m not sure if that made a difference.
Under the Setting/General/About tab it says I have 0 songs and 0 videos.
Does anybody have any other solutions? Should I even bother with a visit to the Genius Bar?
How unbelievable is Apple? So advanced and yet to incapable of correctly performing an update.
I have the same problem as you! Upgraded my itunes and it whiped out everything from my ipod. I’ve tried every single trick but nothing is working. Have tried to figure this out the whole day. Can’t exacetly throw away my Ipod Touch because Apple can’t figure out how to make thing work. It also says that I have 0 songs. I hope someone has a solution!
Thanks…this solution worked very easily
Can you believe that this bug also happens with the iOS5 update?!? You’d think that Apple would have made a fix for this bug and tested it thoroughly! Thanks for your help, I changed my language to British English and it fixed the error. Pity I’ve had to spend a day commuting without music. Thanks again.
I’m so sick of going through this everytime I update the OS, and then not having the previous solution work. My Blackberry Bold 9700 sync’d without problems to my iTunes music … selling my iPhone4 and getting a Bold 9900 instead. I’m so f_cking done with this sh_t!!!
OMG! I almost lost my damn mind when I saw there was supposedly “No Content” in my library. I only have about 500mb of my 64gb capacity available. I probably would have cried if I would have had to re-sync all of that music. I discovered the solution before I found this post, but thanks anyway.
thanks so much this worked perfect for me,i will stick to francais lol not reverting to english
The language fix didn’t work for me. in the process of trying the original fix. Any word on whether Apple is working to fix this in the next update?
Thanks for both methods of sorting this glitch.
I am running OS 4.3.3 on a 64 gig iPod Touch 4th gen and was having to restore backups every two days, now I can sort it in minutes.
Come on Apple, you take the money for the hardware, you take the money for the music and video downloads, the least you could do is give us an OS that doesnt wreck our equipment. Not too much to ask is it ?.
Thank you x1,000!!!!!!!!!! The change language worked!!!!!! :D
[…] There was one way that I found out for fixing it which involves the syncing of your iPod, but osXdaily reports that there’s another alternative. So I’ll go ahead and list […]
wow, and i thought microsoft only suffered from bad programming!
are u kidding??.. are you new to maCs or something??
this REALLY works everybody.
Well, at least for my ipod touch.
not all iPhone reconnected to iTunes can play their music in device’s menu that’s why you can’t resolve the problem,(that’s what happened with my phone), in that case the best way is to sync your iPhone to nothing, no music, no video, no apps,,, just remove the check mark on device’s menu telling sync music or sync movies and etc. by clicking on the check mark, after that hit sync. your apps, movies, music etc. will be removed from your phone but once you sync again your music and movies it will definitely appear on your iPod. that’s it, problem solved!
After spending 3 hours synching and restoring (many, many times) and trying the language fix (which did not work), I came across this solution and I am SO GRATEFUL to you, whoever you are. This worked for me. Sincere thanks!
Thnx. Im sick n tired of restoring and then restoring from back up (this also works, but very long process). This is the forth version and they still cant get it right. Are Apple dick heads? I’m starting to think their just ripping holes in our wallets and laughing at us.
I found this fix the first time my iPod went on the fritz, and it worked perfectly. But it decided to do it again today, and nothing is working. So Apple, fix this stupid bug. That is all.
Thanks for the fix, Griga and osxdaily!
Odd, I tried to change the language then open iTunes…for me I had to change the language like, three times before the “Fix” took.
Oh well, at least it worked.
For everyone who switching the language isn’t working for, look under Settings > General > About and make sure that it says you have more than 0 songs. If so, this may work. If not, it means that the update wiped out your collection and you will need to resync it over.
Yes, this happened to me.
And no, switching it from English to French, then English to Portuguese, then English to Italian, then English to German did not work. (Or English to anything).
Long story short, no amount of switch in language settings will bring back the content because Apple’s update robbed me of my property.
Technically, a lawsuit could be done for damages, could it not? Not that it is worth it to me to buy a lawyer, nor can I afford one even for small-claims court. But the fact is it erased my iPod touch, down to everything stored on it. The information is simply NOT “hidden.”
Apple has effectively robbed money, time, and energy from me with this iOS update. Even if this was indirect, they apparently know of this bug and they have neither truly fixed it, or pulled the iOS update.
What has been done is highly illegal. I EXPECT compensation. Not that I will get it, but I never appreciate being robbed. It’s against the law, and Apple has no excuse as they cannot plead ignorance here. If your product is dysfunctional, pull it. Otherwise you might as well be selling lead toys. Though at least your negligence has at least not threatened health, it has certainly denied me of my right to property.
Other than that, thank you to everyone, especially Griga, for providing answers and helping everyone. I am only sorry that I am one of the few that had an entire erase, as opposed to an error in display.
My Ipod says it has no more than 0 songs. Resync doesn’t help. What should I do?
thanks!
Switching the language worked for me!!!!!!!!!
wow, nice now whos the one that found this one out
I just got my replacement iPad from Apple today. My original iPad kept giving me an error msg “iPhone cannot connect to network” (well…that’s because you’re NOT an iPhone, silly iPad!)
This iPad came with 4.2.1 installed and I had the iPod issue. I had to try both of the steps above before mine would populate. All well now thanks to your tips. Apple did manage to restore all my settings and emails but my apps are gone. :( I do have to say though – the service was excellent.
This saved me so much frustration! The language settings trick was so simple and worked perfectly. What a stupid bug though. Thanks!
That trick really worked! Thank you so much! :)
none of this worked for me. I have an ipod touch 2nd generation and tried the language, the sync, the purchase & sync, and still nothing…I only had 600 songs in my itunes (couldn’t get the rest transferred) and had a total of 3,600 songs in my upod.
This is quite unfortunate that I can’t ge this to work…Though, when I look under ‘my computer’ and the properties of the ipod it shows that there is 14.3gb used (it is only a 16gb ipod touch) and 13.3gb available for a total of 27.7gb (again, this is only a 16gb ipod touch)
Any help our other ideas would be much appreciated.
I also had this problem and neither the language nor the playing music fix worked. I did find something that worked after about 12 hours of pulling my hair out, not that I had much to begin with. I bought a song on my iphone (3gs), not through the computer, from the itunes store. After it downloaded it was the only song on my iphone, then I synced the phone to the computer. My problem was then solved. My only assumption was that because the downloaded song also needed to be synced to the computer it corrected the bug. I hope this helps someone who the other fixes did not work for.
Brilliant! Such a quick fix. Thank you!
THE LANGUAGE SWITCH WORKED BEAUTIFULLY. FREAKED OUT WHEN I SAW ALL MY MUSIC DISAPEAR AFTER THE UPDATE. THANKS GRIGA
I have ipod 4th gen and when i try to sync my music it says its all on there then when i look on my ipod it says no content, ive tried the changing language and playing a song from itunes while syncing and resyncing over and over again, nothing is working anyone any ideas why? miss my ipod! :(
if you have tried everything and nothing work’s try shutting down your firewall than resync your ipod and it should be fixed.
Thank you will! Turning off my firewall worked when nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing, had worked for my 4th gen touch. I hope Rhiannon did the same.
Awesome! The Standard fix worked for me.
Thanks.
Thanks for the tips, I was brickin’ myself >_< Good to see my songs etc back ^_^
I could cry because I am so happy this worked. THANK YOU!
Thanks a bunch worked a treat here in Denmark :)
Thanks!!!
Thanks for the post on fixing the problem via a language change. It worked perfectly and was very simple.
Thanks for the post. Had the problem and the language swap fixed it. Crazy.
I did the fix with changing the language and it worked (iPhone 4). Thank you very much, That saved me a lot of time, especially because I was on holiday without having the possibility to sync!
Wow, to whoever spent the time figuring this one out…THANK YOU! I was going nuts…just purchased an album on the iPhone and once it had downloaded, it vanished. My computer still has Tiger so not compatible anymore with iTunes 10 and the POS iPhone 4.2.whatever update…worked like a charm you made my day!
you are a serious star. I am on holidays for two weeks. Arrived to the pool yesterday and no music, no podcasts, no videos, no tv shows. Nothing. Did your fix. You are a gem. thank you thank thank you.
OMG!! THANK YOU!!!!. I just updated my os on my ipod touch last night and everything seemed fine until I turned it on @ work and all my music/movies were completely gone. I was almost in tears trying to figure out what I was going to do. Thank God for google and coming across this website. The instructions were so on point and easy to follow and now I have all my music/videos back in less than 5 minutes!!!
This fix worked perfectly for me. I so did not want to resync my whole library. It would have been such a tedious waste of time and this fix only took about a minute and a half! Good tip! Thanks very much!
Simply play a song from the itouch within itunes and all your music will be restored.
I updated my mums ipod on my computer because her computer isnt letting her ipod sync, and when i updated it all the music was gone!
found this article… couldn’t believe it, it worked!!!
Thank you thank you thank you!
Thanks for the tip. Worked for me too :)
Saves me having to reset and re-sync the phone (and spend the whole day without music)
Worked for me! Thank you!
thanks griga you legend! was a bit worried after loading the library in french and nothing changed but reverting back to english and boom everything is back – am overseas for a few months so thanks so much!
The language tip did not work for me, but the re-syncing tip did. Thank you so much for helping me not have to re-add all my music to my iTouch again!
help
This didn’t worked and it still say no content but iTunes show my music on my iPod
Whew! Thanks!
Thank goodness for this post and that I could find it! This worked PERFECTLY. Now I have shared with MANY others experiencing the same problem. They just don’t believe me when I tell them what to do….but once you convince them; they see it works. THANK YOU!!!!
Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Your fantastic fix saved years of music & video.
[…] the brilliant humans at http://www.OSXDaily.comOSXDaily.com have found the answer to getting all of your music and video content back onto your […]
The language-change fix worked like a charm. Thanks! BUT this caused a new glitch on my iPhone 3G 8Gb! I skimmed thru all the reponses and can’t beliebe that no one else seems to be experiencing this. How odd. Specifically, ever since i performed the “set phone to French and switch back to English” procedure, the spellcheck feature in the iPhone got stuck on French. Yup, that means that all of my English typing is being force-corrected to French, every word of it. Very annoying and slows me down considerably. There’s another evidence of this French left-over in my texting window: the lower part says “espace” for “space” and “retour” instead of “return”. Bizarre. I tried switching to another language (with a non-Latin alphabet) and back to English, but the French artifacts remain. Let me know please if you have any fix ideas for this crapola. Thanks!
Try completely shutting it down, waiting, then turning it back on.
Figured it out. Go to SETTINGS, then GENERAL, then INTERNATIONAL. Tap on LANGUAGE. Now, tap on KEYBOARDS. Tap the EDIT button on the top right of the screen. Delete the French keyboard.
That’s it.
I had the exact problem and your keyboard solution worked perfectly – where do you folks get these ideas?? I want to go there. Awesome!! Thanks so much
Thanks – I used the language settings change and it worked without syncing.
So. The only thing that worked was a recovery. (…)
Thanks! I was pissed when I started my 20 min walk to work and found that all my podcasts has mysteriously disappeared. I also have no sync cable here at work, so I’m glad this fix was so simple.
Next time, I think I’ll wait a little longer before installing these updates.
THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!
Nearly the same with my iPhone (1st G)…
It did not work for me. Plus, it is now impossible to sync my ipod on itunes. I only have access to the firts thumb, all the others (music, pics, apps, etc) have disappeard. Itunes can no longer know how much space is available on my ipod, it says N/A. Any idea on what I should do?
LOL … Bad Apple. Worked a charm Language solution
THANK YOU for the easy fix… whew!
Thanx a lot,it really worked instantly.once again thanx from the bottom if my heart.
The language change worked for me but not until after it had been changed back to English.
Languge change worked for me.
Found this link on train to work
2 mins later music library has returned.
Big thank you to author, you’re a super *
Just had the same issue on my 3Gs with 4.2.1. The fix above worked as suggested and regained my player and library. Thanks for the help.
Changing the language worked perfectly. Thanks for the tip. The geek in me wants to know why that works.
Changing the language worked beautifully! I’m glad because I lost all my iTunes music from my computer after it crashed. Thanks a lot for the fix!
Vielen Dank! (Thank You!)
It worked, both for me and a friend! You guys are awesome! :-)
It worked for me. A great relief because I had lost all my music content on my computer from a disk crash. :-(
I did this to fix my iPod issue and now when I go to Settings –>General–>International–>Calendar–>
It says Gregorian, please help!
And now when I text, everything is underlined in red, as incorrect.
btw, the calendar options are; Gregorian, Japanese and Buddhist
Just a tip — you should make sure the iPod app is completely closed before trying the Language solution (not running in the background — double tap the Home button and shut down the app completely from the background process menu). Then restart the iPod app. That’s what finally managed to get it the solution to work for me.
Still need help with my original iPhone. Pls!!!
Worked on mt 3Gs as well. Good like trick that. Much appreciated !
Tried the tip of changing language and then back to english…clicked on iPod and hey presto all my music was back!!! :D thanks Griga!!
The language change worked great to get my music and video back after the update. Thanks Griga!!
Switching from English to French and then back to English worked on my 3Gs!! Thanks Griga!
My only question is….WHY that would work, lol.
Thank goodness for Google! Thanks for the rescue!
Mh! Both doesn’t work with my iPhone 8GB (guess 2nd Generation). So I still need help… thx!
Nope. It’s the 1st Generation (pretty old hu?!). Hope this helps…
Girga, thanks for the info! Changing the lanuage worked like a charm!
Great fix Griga!
Your solution should be added to the main article!
Damnn how come I didn’t think of changing the language!!! Thanks
Thanks Griga! Changing the language setting from English to French and back worked like a charm! All of my music and play lists are back! THANK YOU!
Only some of my songs disappeared from my iphone but are still in iTunes. By disappeared I mean the song shows on the phone but skips it and plays the next song. Does anyone know if the suggestions above will fix this and restore the ones that are being skipped? Does anyone have any suggestions? Thx
aint gonna hurt to try the language tip, its reversable and only takes a minute, even with thousands of songs.
I did both the language change and then opened and disconnected my iphone 3gs to itunes and it worked. Safe to say there would be now way of me going home to resync to my pc as I’m travelling round the world. Thanks GRIGA!!!
Connecting to iTunes did not work for me, but changing the language and then reverting back to English worked a treat!!!
Thanks!
Thanks Griga, much easier than having to sync with iTunes. Fixed in about 30 seconds and easy enought to do.
Guys, it’s much easier than that. Iphone 4, 4.2.1 Just
1. change the language to any other,
2. try opening ipod. Wait (up to a minute) for library to update
3. then revert back to English
If you happen to speak only English (most of US residents?), then here is the guide for French system: language = langue, English = Anglais
Good luck;)
Merci Griga! worked wonderfully. you are my hero!
Works for ipod touch as well.
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I am traveling for work and can not synch to iTunes from my work computer. Unfortunately I tried to redownload an album before I found this info and will be charged a second time for an album I already own :( bummer
Griga! You are a genius! That worked like a charm!!!
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! I thought I lost all my content, so I tried this and worked in about a minute, thanks so much!
btw i tried it in spanish so i can have a better chance of getting back to the language page and that worked :)
Wish it was that easy…I have tried all of the “fixes” listed here and nothing…15 GB of music that shows up from iTunes but NOTHING on my ipod…have reloaded operating system 3 times, loaded music just as many times but it still shows “no music” when I look at my ipod. Seems that I have a very expensive (and very light) boat anchor…
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
THANKS!!!! It worked for me!
So how do I set it back to manually manage my music? Does that mean I basically have to add it all on again? That’s ridiculous
Fixed!
I’m glad there is a simple fix. However, this does me no good as I am away from my computer and out of town for the holiday weekend. Most frustrating of all… I went to the iTunes store and actually purchased new content directly from my iPod and it does not appear either. Very frustrating.
@Stilton – it’s your fault if your stuff isn’t on your computer. iPhone is not meant to be a backup of your music.
This fix didn’t work for me – nor has anything else I’ve found. Checking “info” on my iPod shows NO SONGS, nor does iTunes show any songs on the device.
I’m glad that the “simple fix” has worked for some – but I clearly had 7 gigs of music permanently wiped out. Happy Effing Thanksgiving, Apple.
I had the same problem.
I had upgraded iTunes & updated firmware on my iPod touch. Suddenly, my iPod stopped syncing music with iTunes. Tried resetting, and then there was “No Content” at all on my iPod. Syncing just did nothing.
None of the above fixes worked either, although it is entertaining to read my iPod in French.
Try this: With iPod and computer connected & iTunes open, under ‘Devices’ in the L.H. sidebar of iTunes, select your iPod. Go to the ‘Music’ tab in the iPod menu and go to ‘Sync Music.’ When I did this, it was unchecked. If that’s true for you to, then check the box and, in the menu below, select which artists you want to sync. Click ‘Apply.’
This was not a perfect fix b/c I could only select by Artist, not by album or song, which is annoying b/c I have more music in iTunes than I can fit on my iPod, & some of it is by the same artist. But after wasting an evening trying to figure this out, it worked for me and now I have music on my iPod again.
Good luck.
Apple in Southampton failed to restore my nana but after reloading itunes for windows 10 and following the above it fixed the “No music” message and worked a treat and can now access the music that my PC showed was actually there. Brilliant
I am now an official geek.
John
Thanks for the fix. Worked like a charm!
Worked like a charm. Thanks!
[…] […]
Worked without any problem Thanks for your help
I also lost the thumbnail when I view albums as well. I ended up removing all of my music and reloading everything.
wow, how lame is this??
I had the same problem but I didn’t have to go through these steps to fix it.
In iTunes, I have it set to Sync nothing, no music, no apps, no podcasts, absolutely nothing. But I simply clicked the Sync button and all my music magically returned. Thankfully.
Hope this helps.
I fixed mine by just turning it of and then back on! Got my photo’s back.
Thanks!!
I had the same problem and did the following:
In iTunes select iPod device -> Music. Instead of Entire Music Library, I selected Selected playlists, artists, albums, and genres. Then Apply. When that completed I went back to Entire Music Library. Then Apply. My audio and video content had all come back.
Thank you Sparky, You helped me in 2019 <3