Check and Rate your Media

In this lesson for iTunes on the Mac, we look at how we add checkboxes to your list view in iTunes, and why we’d want to, as well as how we add star ratings to iTunes.

Adding Checkboxes
With iTunes what we can do is sync only checked songs to our iOS device. You’ll see this option in when you manage your iOS device. The problem with iTunes, if you want to do this, is that the checkboxes are turned off by default. To be able to check the songs you want to sync or maybe include in a Smart Playlist, you need to go to iTunes Preferences and turn checkboxes on. To do this, we go to iTunes in the menu bar and select Preferences. A new window will open with our iTunes Preferences. Now we need to go to General. Under General is an option for ‘List view checkboxes.’ When this is selected, you’ll see checkboxes to all your songs. Now you can select the songs you want to include in your syncing options when you manage your devices.

Rating Songs in iTunes
To add the option to rate your songs with 1 to 5 stars, you again need to go to your iTunes preferences. Just like checkboxes, this feature is turned off by default. With iTunes preferences open, under General, you’ll see an option for ‘Star ratings.’ When you select this, you’ll have a new option or column when you are viewing your songs. To rate a song, just click on the number of stars you want to rate it. From there you can create a Smart Playlist showing only your 4 or 5-star songs.

See this Lesson in Action
If you want to see this lesson in action, take a look at the video above.

Lesson tags: Mac Tutorials
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