If you've been accumulating songs on your Mac for years, you probably have files with impossible names like author_name_-_track_name_downloaded-from-ytbdownload.com.mp3. All of that can be fixed by properly managing metadata in iTunes and the Music appso that your library is clean, organized, and easy to search, both on your Mac and your connected Apple devices.
Metadata is simply the "technical data sheet" for each song: title, artist, album, year, track number, genre, composer, cover art… Learning to edit that information in macOS makes all the difference between a chaotic library and one that's meticulously curated.And the best part is that you can do it directly with iTunes or Music, without relying on strange apps, and combining it if you want with more advanced tag editors.
What are music metadata and why do they matter so much?
Audio metadata is the information embedded within the music file itself. which describes what you're listening to: who recorded it, what album it belongs to, what year it's from, what musical style it has, etc. They're not just "decorative labels": they condition how songs are displayed and organized on all your players.
Thanks to this data you can Filter, sort, and find songs by artist, album, genre, year, or even composer.If the metadata is incorrect or incomplete, your library will be filled with "Track 01", separate albums that should be together, or songs that are impossible to find on the iPhone by the correct name.
In practice, when you edit metadata in iTunes or the Music app, you can adjust common fields such as Artist, Album, Song Title, Genre, Year, Track Number or Album Cover, in addition to more advanced options such as composer, album artist, compilation, disc number, rating or even lyrics.
All this data is normally stored within the audio file itself (for example, in ID3 tags for MP3)This means that if you export that song to another compatible player, the information travels with it: the album art, the album name, the year... everything you've saved from the "Info" box in iTunes or Music.
There are some particularly important fields that you should be clear about if you want a well-organized library on your Mac:
- Artist: group or person who has recorded the album or song.
- Album: title of the CD, LP or EP to which the track belongs.
- Composer: who wrote the song, if you want to differentiate it from the performer.
- Gender: musical style (rock, pop, folk, electronic, etc.).
- Year: year of release of the album.
- Disc number: useful in albums with several CDs, to indicate "disc X of Y".
- Compilation: This is marked when the album brings together songs from several artists (for example, a soundtrack).
When these fields are completed correctly, Searching for “all songs by X artist released in 2005” or “all electronic music above a certain BPM” becomes almost instantaneous, both on the Mac and on other synchronized devices.
Edit metadata in the macOS Music app (current library)
In current versions of macOS, managing your local collection is done through the Music app. This app not only plays your songs, it also functions as a fairly complete metadata editorespecially if you have your own files (imported from CDs, old downloads, demos, etc.).
One important detail: by default, when modifying the information of an item in Music, The file name on the disk can be changed automatically to stay consistent with that data. This is fine if you let Music organize your entire content folder, but it can be a problem if you use those same files with other music apps or managers.
If you want Music to stop automatically renaming and rearranging your files, you can disable the corresponding setting:
- Open the Music app on your Mac. and log in with your usual username.
- Go to menu Music > Settings… (or Preferences, depending on the version).
- In the Archivesuncheck the option “Keep the content folder organized”.
By unchecking that box, You prevent the Music app from reorganizing your physical library. In Finder, every time you modify the metadata, you'll still be able to edit all the information, but the file will retain its path and name at the file system level.
From there, editing a song's information in the Music app is very straightforward. These steps apply to any track you have in your local library. (not Apple Music's pure streaming services):
- In the left panel, inside Library, enters the view Songs to see the complete list of tracks.
- Locate the song whose metadata you want to change and click on it with the right button (or with two fingers on the trackpad).
- In the context menu, choose Information o Song informationas it appears to you.
- A window with several tabs will open: Details, Illustration, Letters, Options, Classification, File, etc.
Inside the tab Details You'll see all the most common fields that you can easily rewrite: title, artist, album artist, composer, album, year, track number, disc number, genre, compilation… Simply click on each field and enter the correct information.When you're finished, press OK To save the changes.
The change is immediate: as soon as you accept, The song information is updated in your library, and if you have it synced with your iPhone or iPad, it will propagate when you resync.There is no "back" button as such; if you want to revert something, you will have to manually edit the field again and enter the previous value.
In the Illustration You can add, replace, or remove album covers. Simply drag an image into the box or use the button to select a graphic file.This cover art is also embedded in the file in many formats, so that other players can display it.
The eyelash Mazatlán's Letters it allows you add custom fonts or correct existing onesIt's especially useful for imported songs that don't include lyrics, or for live versions, remixes, and demos. The best part is that if you have an Apple Music library, these lyrics will also sync across all your devices.
If you want to get even more detailed, you can go into Options to activate a song-specific equalizerYou can adjust the relative volume of that track, set its exact start and end points, or mark it as part of a compilation. All of this is also part of the song's overall behavior within your Apple ecosystem.
Using iTunes on macOS to edit ID3 tags and organize your collection
On Macs with earlier versions of macOS, or if you still use iTunes on Windows, the process is very similar. iTunes acts as a player, organizer, and metadata editor all at onceso you can clean an old library without needing any additional tools.
To work with your files in iTunes, the first thing to do is check that you are in the correct section:
- Opens iTunes and enter the section of Library, where all your songs are displayed.
- In the drop-down menu in the upper left corner, select the mode Music o Hudba (if it appears in another language) to focus only on audio.
- In the sidebar, choose how you want to filter: Artists, Albums, Songsetc. The view of Songs It is usually the most convenient way to quickly locate individual tracks.
Once you locate the song to correct, the metadata editing process is virtually identical to that of the Music app. You can use the context menu or the main menu bar.:
- click with it right button on the track and choose Song information (or “Album/Artist Information” in some cases).
- Or select the song and, from the top bar, go to Song > Information.
- You can also use the keyboard shortcut Command + I to directly open the information box.
In the window that opens you will see tabs like Details, Illustration, Letters, Options, Classification and Filing. The logic is the same: in Details you have the most relevant ID3 tagsAnd by clicking on each field you can modify the content to your liking.
In addition to the typical title, artist, and album, iTunes allows you to edit fields such as album artist, composer, track number, disc number, or mark an album as a compilation.This data is then used by the player to group discs, order songs within each album, or correctly display information on iOS devices.
iTunes' ID3 tag support is quite comprehensive: it can work with different versions (ID3v1, ID3v2, iTunes-specific tags, etc.). Everything you modify using "Get Info" (Info) is written to the file, so it is not lost even if you remove it from the library..
In the IllustrationJust like in Music, you can add an album cover to make it easier to visually identify the album. The cover art is usually embedded in the audio file itself.not only in the iTunes database, so if you move that MP3 or AAC to another program that reads the tags, the same cover art will appear.
Regarding the lyrics, iTunes lets you Insert custom letters and view all the ID3 tags you've addedThis is useful if you later want other players (or older iOS devices) to display the embedded lyrics without relying on online services.
Limitations with Apple Music and streaming songs
Although iTunes and the Music app are very powerful for local collections, Not all the songs you see in your library allow the same changes.There are clear differences between local tracks and tracks that come from the streaming service. Apple Music for offline listening.
The songs you've downloaded from Apple Music to listen to offline, but which actually belong to the streaming catalog, They don't let you rewrite their main metadata (title, artist, original album, etc.). This information comes "out of the box" from Apple's servers and is updated centrally.
Yes, you can, however, add or modify some data at the level of your personal library (ratings, some playback options, inclusion in playlists(custom fonts in some cases), but the bulk of the descriptive labels are locked to maintain catalog consistency.
There is a relative exception if you are an artist or work with a label: linking your account with Apple Music for Artists / iTunes ConnectYou can manage much of the official metadata (credits, cover art, etc.) for your own releases within the service. However, this is more professional-level and not what most users need for their local library.
In contrast, any track you have as your own file on your Mac (CD rips, old downloads, home recordings) Yes, it's fully editable from iTunes or Music. That's where the power of these tools truly shines compared to services like Spotify, which don't allow you to integrate and manipulate your local files with such depth.
Many users discover too late that, thanks to this edition, The distinctions between “original songs” and Apple Music songs"in the user experience: coherent covers, integrated lyrics, carefully crafted metadata… All synchronized through the cloud in the Apple ecosystem.
Bulk metadata editing and alternatives to iTunes/Music
If you only want to occasionally adjust the information for a single song, iTunes or Music is sufficient. But when you have hundreds or thousands of files downloaded from countless sites, Editing them one by one from the information box becomes a real ordeal.In these situations, batch label editors come into play.
macOS has dedicated tools, such as Music Tag Editor and other metadata editorsThese programs allow you to process entire folders at once. They are designed for musicians, DJs, bloggers, or enthusiasts with huge collections who need quick and systematic cleaning.
A professional editor of this type usually offers Support for virtually all common audio formatsMP3, MP2, AAC, M4A, MP4, FLAC, OGG, APE, AIFF, WAV, WMA, DSF/DSDIFF, MKV, TTA, and many others. It also understands different types of tags: ID3v1, ID3v2, Xiph Comments, APE tags, Ogg Vorbis, RIFF Info, ASF, and even iTunes-specific tags.
Among its most useful functions are:
- Batch editing of metadata in almost any format, with the ability to apply changes to hundreds of songs at once.
- Custom labels: add additional keys and values beyond the typical title/artist/album.
- Automatic download of album covers, lyrics, and metadata from the Internet, completing the missing fields in your collection.
- Batch file renaming based on existing metadata.
- Extracting metadata from the filename itself using regular expressions (ideal for cleaning downloads with very long names).
- Bulk text search and replace, with support for regular expressions and replacement groups.
- Batch label cleaning, conversion to uppercase/lowercase, removal of extra spaces, automatic track renumbering, etc.
- Text encoding conversion to fix illegible characters (strange accents, strange symbols).
- Compatibility with multi-value tags and advanced ID3 fields (lists of people involved TIPL, musician credits TMCL, popularity POPM, properties OWNE…).
- Integrated music player to review what you're editing without leaving the app.
- Export to CSV with one click, in case you want to document your collection in a spreadsheet.
In addition, many of these editors include different editing modes (for example, “grid mode” and “flow list mode”)This allows you to change your focus depending on whether you want to view many fields at once or focus on just a few.
Another interesting alternative, especially if you also work with video, is to use tools like Vidmore Video Converter or similar solutionsAlthough they are presented as multimedia converters, they usually incorporate an integrated metadata editor (“Multimedia Metadata Editor”) with which you can modify title, artist, album, year, track number, even cover and comments, in both audio and video.
The typical workflow with this type of editor would be:
- Install the tool and open it on your Mac.
- Go to section Toolbox (or similar) and choose the Multimedia metadata editor.
- Add the audio or video file you want to correct.
- Edit the fields that appear (title, author, album, cover, comments, etc.).
- Save the changes so that they are recorded in the file itself.
These types of programs usually accept almost any format without needing to convert it first. So you can adjust metadata for MP3, M4A, MP4, MKV, and many more in a unified way.It's a good option if iTunes/Music falls short or is too cumbersome for occasional tasks.
Manage music by folders in Finder and choose the right software
Not everyone wants to depend on a library like iTunes or Music. Many people prefer to manage their music directly as files and folders. in the Finder (for example, /Music or on an external drive), especially if you work with multiple programs like Rekordbox, Traktor, etc.
The problem is that Finder, as it comes out of the box, It doesn't display too much advanced metadata or fields like bitrate, genre, BPM, or other audio data.This complicates things a bit if you want to use only the file system as the "command center" for your collection.
In that scenario, the ideal solution is to have a lightweight player or manager that meets several very specific requirements:
- Not forcing you to import all your music into an internal databasebut to be able to point to a folder (for example, /Music) and navigate directly through it.
- Allow viewing columns with useful information such as bit rate, genre, duration, track number, etc.
- Offer filters and sorting by metadata, to quickly select, for example, just one genre or one quality range.
- Include bulk metadata editing without needing to resort to a closed library.
- Being able to directly play and shuffle the contents of a folder (and its subfolders) without further complication.
- Make it easier to move and delete files or folders to keep the hard drive in order.
Ultimately, a very common workflow is to combine several layers: Basic folder organization in Finder, metadata editing with a dedicated editor, and using iTunes/Music or Rekordbox only as a playback and playlist layerThis way you avoid getting "stuck" in a single library, but you still benefit from the advantages of each program.
If you think about it, spending a few hours organizing all that metadata you've been carrying around since school with unreadable names is well worth it: Your music will be easier to find, will sound more consistent thanks to per-track volume and equalization options, and will integrate better with the Apple ecosystem and other players..
Understand what metadata is, how iTunes and the Music app handle it, what limitations exist with Apple Music, and what external tools can help you edit it in bulk. It allows you to transform a messy collection into a well-organized and truly enjoyable library.Whether you listen to music daily or only revisit your favorite albums occasionally.
