How to Deauthorize All Devices from Apple Music or iTunes
Have several old systems using your Apple Music? Problems can arise. So, here’s how to deauthorize all devices in iTunes or Apple Music.
I began using Apple Music because I had tried other services like Tidal and Spotify. Since I’m an iPhone user, it is convenient to pay for Apple One and get my storage, music, Apple TV shows, and more included. However, if you’re having problems, it can help to deauthorize all devices.
The Apple One bundle provides iCloud+, Apple TV+, Apple Music, Apple Arcade, Apple Fitness+, and Apple News+ (some of which you may not even need). However, getting the bundle is cheaper than subscribing to each service separately.
However, if you have been an Apple Music or iTunes user for a long time, you may have extra authorized devices that you no longer use or may no longer have. You are allowed five authorized devices, but too many can cause problems, which I will explain in the following section.
Fixing an Apple Music Problem
The bundle is a good deal. However, I get this message popping up annoyingly while using Apple Music on my iPhone. The music pauses, and I must tap Not Now on the error message and then press Play to resume streaming.
In addition, sometimes the error doesn’t appear, but the music seems to stop for no reason. So, to resolve the issue, I figured it would be a good idea to deauthorize all my other devices (ones that I don’t even have or use) to fix the problem. This can also help in situations where you are unable to authorize another device to use the streaming music service.
Regardless of the reason, this guide will show you how to sign out of all your devices in one fell swoop.
Sign Out All of the Devices Using Apple Music
Signing out of all devices via Apple Music is straightforward, provided you know where to look. However, you can only do this from your PC or Mac computer. To deauthorize your devices, follow the steps below.
- Launch the Apple Music app on your computer.
- Click the account icon in the lower-left corner of the app.
- When the menu appears, you can sign out of the device you’re using. However, to sign out of all of them, you want to click View My Account.
- Type in your Apple ID password and click the Sign In button to continue.
- Now, find the Computer Authorizations section and click the Deauthorize All button to continue.
- When the verification message appears, click the Deauthorize All button.
- Once you deauthorize all devices, you will receive a confirmation message that everything was unauthorized successfully. Click OK to close out of the message.
Use iTunes to Deauthorize Devices
This one may get a little tricky. You can still use iTunes to deauthorize all devices, provided it is installed on your computer and still works. Please note that Apple is soon pulling support for the aging music manager for Windows. The Apple Music app will take over for iTunes as your music manager.
Luckily, iTunes is still working on my Windows 10 machine. If you can get iTunes going, here are the steps to deauthorize your devices.
- Open iTunes and click Account > View My Account from the toolbar.
- Type in your Apple ID and password, and click the Sign In button.
- Next, on the Account Settings screen, click the Deauthorize All button.
- When the verification message appears, click the Deauthorize All button to confirm.
That’s all there is to it. Once complete, you can click OK on the confirmation message that appears and close out of your account settings.
Deauthorizing All Devices for Apple Music or iTunes
If you don’t want to worry about finding and deauthorizing your devices individually, you can do it all in one fell swoop from account settings. The good news is you can do it from iTunes if it still works on your PC or use Apple Music. There is no reason to install iTunes just to deauthorize your devices. The above steps will deauthorize all devices regardless of the platform you use.
If you are wondering about the error I received while listening to Apple Music (shown above), the good news is that it seems to have been fixed. Deauthorizing all my devices seems to have worked, which is good news if you have a similar issue.
This article was originally published on November 26, 2011. It has been fully rewritten to reflect the latest updates as of May 8, 2024.