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Change song order in a playlist in Apple Music on a Mac (Golden Gate 27.2)

Not sure when things changed, but there was a time I could go into individual playlists I had created and change the order of the songs from my initial selection. Now when I try to move songs to a new position it is not so easy. 




In trying to resolve the issue I changed the view of the playlist from Playlist to Songs from the top View menu. This “compresses” the image of the playlist, showing more songs on the screen and allows me to move the songs about in an easier way. 




There are, however, still limitations. If you have the scroll bar on permanently at the bottom then trying to move a track down the playlist is limited as the track can’t get over the scroll bar. Solution -  don’t display the scroll bar on Always. Go to Settings>Appearance and change the scroll bar setting to Automatically based on mouse or trackbar. 




Sadly this is not the end of the problem. Depending on the number of songs in the playlist, moving songs towards the bottom of the playlist can be stopped by the mini player. I have not solved this issue as it appears one cannot move or hide the mini player. The only solution in this case is to make the change in two moves. 




The issue of moving songs in a playlist is the same when trying to move a song up towards the top of the playlist. Again, depending on the number of songs in the playlist of course, you cannot always move songs to the top in one go and have to perform the change in multiple moves.




I apologise for the complex nature of this issue and I hope I have described it as clearly as possible. Any thoughts or suggestions would be very welcome.

3 replies

Songs view and hiding the always-on scrollbar are the right first steps. The drag still dies for two other reasons. The playlist has to be in manual order. In Songs view, click the column headings until the little sort arrow is gone. If it's sorted by title, artist, or time, macOS won't let you drop a song in a new spot. The mini player blocks the bottom of the list, and auto-scroll doesn't cross it. Make the window taller, then drag in short hops. Hold the song and scroll with two fingers on the trackpad instead of pushing into the mini player. Smart playlists can't be reordered at all. If this is a normal playlist and the Mac still fights you, reorder it on the iPhone. With Sync Library on, that order comes back to the Mac.

Just an edit on my reply. "Sadly the iPhone resolution will not work for me as I am not an Apple Music subscriber". I found this is not strictly true. An Apple Music Subscriber has the option to Sync Library under the iPhone settings, but this option is not displayed for a non-Apple Music subscriber There is, however, a workaround. The first part is to ensure Wi-Fi syncing between the Mac and iPhone is setup. First connect iPhone to Mac using a USB cable. Then open Finder, select device, check the box for "Show this [device] when on Wi-Fi," and click Apply. After this initial setup, the iPhone will sync automatically when both devices are on the same Wi-Fi network. After this is setup the playlist changes can be made on the iPhone rather than the Mac as per tillu_code's suggestion. I cannot, however, seem to get the changes to appear automatically, but the changes will appear on the next hard wire sync with the iPhone and Mac. Perhaps someone can add to this methodology?

Many thanks for your very helpful response. For me the resolution on the Mac seems to be to move the songs in gradual steps. The issue in all honesty is the positioning of the Mini Player. If one could move the player to the top of the screen or temporarily hide it I would have no issue moving songs around. I will suggest that to Apple. Sadly the iPhone resolution will not work for me as I am not an Apple Music subscriber.