Move iTunes music folder

You may have come across the problem of running out of space on the hard drive your iTunes are stored on, maybe you have it installed on a work computer and your files are actually on a network drive, or maybe you want to move your music to a completely new computer. Whatever the reason, sometimes it would be nice to be able to move where your iTunes are located. There used to be a registry hack to do this, but it appears that in newer versions of iTunes (at least since v7, maybe even in v6) they've made it much simpler. One thing to note up front is that you shouldn't mess with moving the actual library files, just the music files. I'm not saying it can't be done, but it's listed as something to read more about in the Apple how-to articles below.

For Windows

1. Open iTunes.
2. Go to Edit->Preferences.
3. Go to the Advanced tab, then the General tab within it

4. Make sure the "Keep iTunes Music folder organized" checkbox is checked

5. Click the Change button to the right of the iTunes Music folder pane
6. In the window that appears, navigate to the location where you would like your new folder to be created, or where your previous folder already exists. Select it and Click OK

7. Click Ok to exit the preferences

8. Go to File-> Library->Consolidate Library iTunes 8 or choose Advanced-> Consolidate Library for iTunes 7

9. You'll see a warning message, which you can ignore. Click the Consolidate button

10. That's it. You can go trash the original iTunes music folder if you'd like, but remember to be careful about removing the iTunes library files as stated above

For Mac

1. From the iTunes menu, go to Preferences

2. Go to Advanced

3. Check the "Keep iTunes Music folder organized" box

4. Click Ok

5. Repeat step #1 and #2

6. Click on the Change button to the right

7. Navigate to the new iTunes music folder location you want to use

8. Click Open

9. Click Ok

10. Go to File-> Library->Consolidate Library...

11. You'll see a warning message, which you can ignore. Click the Consolidate button

12. Just like #10 for Windows, that's it. You can go trash the original iTunes music folder if you'd like, but remember to be careful about deleting the iTunes library files as stated above

Apple's official support articles

Move iTunes for Windows

Move iTunes for Mac

About moving the iTunes library files