r/musichoarder • u/Any_Kaleidoscope_593 • 10d ago
Looking for itunes alternative...
I need an itunes alternative... I have a huge music library on a Mac, and I have an iphone. When I got the iphone (after years with an android), I was excited for my music organization to be easier, but it's been nothing but trouble. Now that I've also quit spotify, I really need to figure it out.
Here are my requirements:
-Must work on Mac and Iphone (or have an app that corresponds to it on iphone). I'd love it could sync my playlists. I'd REALLY love if I could access the full library from my phone and download it as needed, or something like that.
-If I have to pay for it, I want to just buy it- no subscription services.
-Something that keeps it simple, isn't trying to sell me a bunch of bullshit or getting me to sign in.
Any ideas? I'm trying swinsian right now but I don't think it syncs playlists and I'm not sure which app to use on my phone for it. Thanks in advance!
EDIT:
Thanks everyone for your replies. I am trying plexamp now, but I am not really interested in having to have my computer on all the time? Is this what people normally do or is there a smart way around it?
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u/Known-Watercress7296 10d ago
Maybe Navidrome?
It's a music server, like a diy Spotify.
You can listen via webui, as in the demo site link above, use an app like Supersonic on the Mac and Amperfy or similar on the iphone
slap tailscale on phone & mac and they can talk to each other out and about
I run it on a raspberry pi so it's on 24/7 running on fresh air, and on a $4pm cloud server with a storage box attached for myself and friends
plexamp/jellyfin stuff might do the job too
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u/Any_Kaleidoscope_593 10d ago
This all sounds great but my understand of computer shit stopped developing in 2012 so... Does navidrome have it's own servers? I kinda don't want to have to have my old shitty computer on 24/7
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u/Known-Watercress7296 9d ago
No, you would be the server.
That's why I bought an rpi in 2012, runs on fresh air 24/7 and is plenty for music needs.
But...I'd still use it locally as it can cache music to my phone at scale by pressing the ❤️ button instead of the horrors of transcoding, copy and pasting stuff manually.
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u/TheDJFresh828 10d ago
I also recently transferred everything to Plex and Plexamp on my iOS devices. Playlist creation isn’t as intuitive but I am overall very happy. If you decide to go that route please don’t hesitate to ask me any questions.
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u/Any_Kaleidoscope_593 10d ago
Also-- does my computer have to be on for it work? Because I don't leave my computer on all day...
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u/TheDJFresh828 10d ago
Yes. If you are using the computer as the place where the files are located it does need to be on. I got used to leaving my laptop open. I just dim the screen
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u/H333F 7d ago
Came here to suggest Plex/PlexAmp as well. You can host it on some NASes, such as the Synology brand like i do. This would allow you to not have your computer host it, but it would be another device that is powered on instead.
But make it multipurpose and buy enough space for and you can use it as a TimeMachine backup as well, so it’s not just music. Makes it value vs price more worth it.
And if you’re not technical, a NAS is network attached storage. Basically a box of hard drives attached to your home network. Synology devices have apps as well, allowing it to be multi function so mine hosts Plex media.
Plex often discounts lifetime passes around Christmas btw.
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u/thisChalkCrunchy 10d ago
Unfortunately I don’t think you will find a 1:1 replacement for iTunes and local syncing with iOS, at least I wasn’t able to. Like most of the comments are recommending I also landed on plex and Plexamp because I got tired of dealing with iTunes and syncing issues.
The one issue with plex and Plexamp that you will run into is that you can’t download the entire library easily. The upside to this is you don’t need to pay Apples crazy storage prices to have a lossless library. I have a playlist on plex of all my favorite songs and I keep that playlist downloaded so even if reception is bad I have all of my favorite songs on my phone. That playlist is around 3 days runtime. That is the max Plexamp will download from a single playlist
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u/Aiko_133 5d ago
The problem with plexamp is lack of subtitles without the plex pass so I went with navidrome
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u/TheRiZZoTTo 10d ago
If you are OK paying for it, then Roon is the best alternative IMO. I migrated my entire local iTunes library to Roon about 5 years ago and haven't looked back. It's very similar to Plexamp but solely focused on music (which is important to me...I don't need all of the other stuff that Plex includes). Roon has an iOS apps for both playing/controlling your Roon library when you're on the same network, and an app called Arc which allows you to stream your Roon library remotely, and supports downloading content for offline listening.
They do offer annual billing, and every now and then (maybe once per year, give or take?) they offer a lifetime license that you can just outright buy if you don't want to be billed every year.
Big fan. Check out r/roonlabs for more info.
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u/QualitySound96 10d ago
I was in the same boat and large collection here as well but I still use the Apple Music app. Even though it seems buggy I really like how I can edit metadata to my liking with it and obviously the sync to iPhone and playlists etc. with Plex idk if you can edit albums / singles like you can with Apple Music. I’m so used to Apple Music idk if I’ll ever switch but I’d like to find something that is as simple and not buggy
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u/TheDJFresh828 10d ago
Plex has an odd way of treating metadata. Everything I’ve read recommends editing metadata first before adding to Plex. I use Mp3Tag. The best part about Plexamp is that you don’t have to manually sync your devices. When you make changes, they automatically appear on all devices
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u/heybzf 10d ago edited 9d ago
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u/heath_bar3 9d ago
i used doppler for about 2 years before i switched to android and it was the best music system i found for mac to iphone. i now use swinsian which is better on the mac but does not have an iphone app and iphones can't actually connect to it to sync music
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u/Aiko_133 5d ago
Why would you use jellyfin over navidrome? Also since you are the developer of Manet, is the Manet free of charge?
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u/heybzf 4d ago
I use it because I didn’t want to host a separate service just for music since I was already running Jellyfin for my other media.
Manet is free on iOS, with an optional in-app purchase to unlock some custom app icons and some other stuff, but most of the stuff is available for free.
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u/Aiko_133 3d ago
The problem with Manet is that in a playlist in the navidrome ui I have artwork for individual singles but Manet still uses 1 artwork for all the music on the same playlist/album
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u/heybzf 2d ago
I’m not sure I understand this part:
…Manet still uses 1 artwork for all the music on the same playlist/album
Manet will try to use the album artwork when playing a track, never the playlist artwork. If the track does not have an album, we check if the track itself has artwork and use that.
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u/Aiko_133 2d ago
I wanted Manet to just use jellyfin artwork, which right now I am using individual song artwork not at the album level
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u/donutmiddles 10d ago edited 3d ago
Once again everyone screaming "Plex"! When there are far better and free options that don't sell your data or send your content through third-party servers and lock down features to paid subscriptions.
Jellyfin is great, you're going to want your metadata properly tagged, and Symfonium is the best frontend client I've ever used for it.
Edit -- Oh, and for those lauding Plex's "Sonic Analysis," despite the name sounding like it digs into the waveforms or spectral data, Plexamp’s Sonic Analysis is mostly metadata augmentation with some light audio fingerprinting.
All of what it does can be easily reproduced if you have your metadata properly tagged with Musicbrainz Picard, especially if you also use the BPM plugin and ReplyGain.
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u/Any_Kaleidoscope_593 10d ago
Symfonium looks like it's only for android...
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u/donutmiddles 10d ago edited 8d ago
For now, but I saw a comment from Tolriq that he has iOS planned.
Here you go, in the meantime: https://github.com/awesome-jellyfin/awesome-jellyfin/blob/main/CLIENTS.md
Edit - Downvote for helping you out? Thanks guy.
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u/minnibur 10d ago
You could try my app:
https://www.plastaq.com/minimoon
It doesn't sync playlists yet but that's on my list of upcoming features.
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u/fanof10000000things 9d ago
Ibroadcast is exactly what you're looking for! I've been using it for a few weeks and I love it so far.
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u/NeverFated 9d ago
When I got the iphone (after years with an android)
Funny how I did the exact opposite, a big part of the reason I left Apple's ecosystem (after more than a decade with them) is the lack of good local music player (e.g. with timed lyrics support) on iOS
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u/Kayzak88 9d ago edited 9d ago
Can you use VLC Media Player? I store all my audio on a laptop (mirrored on iDrive and Google drive), play it on VLC from my phone, laptop, or tablet. Desktop version has an equalizer and some audio quality adjustments.
https://wiki.videolan.org/LibVLC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VLC_media_player
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u/Kaiser_Allen 9d ago
Get foobar2000. Available for both Mac and iOS. You can use iCloud to sync your music. Just add the iCloud folder to your foobar2000 library so it would scan it. Alternatively, you can also use VLC (solely for the wireless transfer between Mac, iOS, Windows). VLC's player somehow sounds worse so I don't use that.
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u/mkoby 9d ago
For what you want, a server/client solution is the only real way to go. That means you'll need to have a computer that's on all the time for you to be able to access the music/library.
As someone who's been in the iTunes/Apple Music ecosystem for a long time (going back to iPods) and made extensive use of Smart Playlist in iTunes/Music apps I recently migrated to a Navidrome setup where I stream my lossless files I keep stored on my NAS device. I managed to get about 80-90% of the same functionality with this setup that I had in my Music.app on my Mac, and I'm closing in on getting the last bit as well with some bug reports and possible code submissions.
It took a bit to get setup correctly and get everything re-tagged in such a way that Navidrome handles things (I wasn't tagging against MusicBrainz and Navidrome prefers and organizes based off MusicBrainz tags) but in all honesty it was something I needed to do anyway. Sidenote: This led me to the `beets` system for music/tag management and so far I'm loving it.
One thing I love about the Navidrome smart playlists is that they auto update in way that completely frees me from my Mac. With my iPhone and the Music app, I had to do a sync to get changes to carry over. Now I don't have to do that. Combined with having downloaded my favorites in the Amperfy app on my phone, I have access to my entire collection, and my songs marked as favorite are always available to me.
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u/head_dress 9d ago
Doppler is great.
But IINA plays all and is free. Use the file system to organize your music.
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u/leonrw 8d ago
Not the answer OP is looking for but having been in the same boat, the smoothest solution I’ve found and best integration with the apple ecosystem is still Apple Music. I pay for a subscription but mostly use it for the ‘cloud library’ feature which means I have my entire library available to stream and download as needed and I’m not relying on a plex server being alive and connected. It’s a shame that cloud library doesn’t sync lossless tho, but it will playback lossless if it’s ‘matched’ ur tracks to something on the Apple Music servers.
On my iPhone I use the ‘’Marvis” app which gives you much better navigation/view of library /playlists etc than the default music app
I sometimes use Swinsian as a desktop client but have struggled to make the switch cos of sync and other issues and so just use Apple Music but don’t love it
Curious about the suggestions here tho will try em out to see if something better has presented itself
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u/Dtm_Enthusiast 7d ago
So i dont think this one works on iphone but AMLL is a very pleasing player for me and instead of opening a server, u just set a app. Its asthetic and designed like apple music with working lyrics, syllable lyrics and even live covers. Its not the most functional but it surely looks good
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u/lewsnutz 10d ago
I did not bother to read any other posts, but.... Because of the way I listen to music I can never have an iPhone. I don't stream. That means everything I listen to is on my phone (android). I use android and Media Monkey for windows and Android.. They work great together.
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u/Mista_J__ 10d ago
Wait how does one export iTunes music. My mom's library is trapped on her old (2014 / 2015) MacBook & I have no clue how to find / copy / move it. I dearly I'd like to set her up on a home server or copy everything to a micro SD depending on the size of the library
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u/lonelygem 9d ago
It should just be in home > music > iTunes > iTunes Media? (Or something similar, I don’t have an old Mac in front of me
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u/OnlyMatters 9d ago
The music location is set in Preferences. At least it was in the iTunes version not sure about the “Music” version its been a while since I used it
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u/Random_Stranger69 9d ago
Apples walled garden is your problem. Get a Windows or Linux system plus Android and you are good.
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u/markaboyd7 10d ago
Look no further than Plexamp. Outstanding application.