Why Can’t I Filter iTunes Based on My Ratings?


According to iTunes, I have 7,526 items. I’m sure a lot of people have more, but with that many items, you make heavy use of the browser — the ability to narrow lists of music by genre, artist and/or album. It makes it easy to play any groups of songs I have in any of those categories.

I can even select multiple items. So, while I have 8 different albums from the Beastie Boys currently on my machine, I can say I just want to listen to a mix of “Hello Nasty” and “Check Your Head.”

The inability to filter on one particular field has always puzzled me. Why can’t I filter on “My Rating” in the same way can filter genre, etc? That would enable me to easily say “play any music 3 stars or more by the Beastie Boys” or “any song rated 5 stars in Rock”, etc.

The closest you can come today is creating “Smart Playlists.” And, in fact, I do do that for a few artists. But creating one for any particular slice of my collection I might want to listen to on a whim is tedious and arduous at best.

So how about it Apple?

One Response to “Why Can’t I Filter iTunes Based on My Ratings?”

  1. Scott Says:

    Um, Bill, you realize that you can just click in the column header ‘My Rating’ and list songs in order of your ratings, right?

    Or are you talking about a real filter, so that the little magnifying glass in the corner will show: Artist, Album, Composer, Song, AND My Rating?

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