New in OS X: Get MacRumors Push Notifications on your Mac

Resubscribe Now Close

Apple Working on Allowing the Merging of Multiple Apple IDs

Thursday September 15, 2011 9:02 pm PDT by Arnold Kim
MacRumors has learned that Apple is working on a process to merge multiple Apple IDs into a single login. The issue of juggling multiple Apple ID logins has been a minor inconvenience in the past, but with the early developer testing of iOS 5 and iCloud, users have found it to be a major issue.

TUAW described the problem back in July, and the answer at that time was that there was no way to consolidate Apple IDs:
Some readers have been managing two Apple IDs on purpose and are now frustrated about the fact that Apple is restricting logins for automatic downloads. Others have only just discovered that they have two IDs. Most of them have already contacted Apple, only to be given the same answer without exception: Apple will not consolidate Apple ID accounts.
MobileMe users especially have found that they now have at least two Apple IDs, their original one and their MobileMe account. Juggling multiple logins while using Apple's Automatic Downloads can be a particular chore since you can't easily switch between logins. Apple locks devices to a single Apple ID for 90 days, preventing any rapid switching between accounts.


Apple has provided no official guidance on the issue, except to state that Apple IDs can not be consolidated at this time.

MacRumors reader Robert emailed Apple CEO Tim Cook about the issue, and quickly received a phone call from an Apple executive relations employee. She had spoken to the team responsible for Apple IDs and acknowledged that they understood the issue and that more people would run into the problem with iCloud. She also repeated that there is no way yet to combine accounts but revealed they are working on it. In the meantime, she recommended picking a single account to plan on keeping indefinitely and to make all future purchases on that account.

Apple's Tim Cook has been particularly responsive to customer emails and inquiries. In a previous example, a user emailed Cook about iTunes Match availability in Canada. That user got a quick reply from Apple's Senior Vice President for Internet Software and Services, Eddy Cue. Apple has announced it will be launching iCloud and iOS 5 to users "this fall".

Update: Another user reports hearing the same information after emailing Tim Cook over the same issue.
[ 111 comments ]


Top Rated Comments

(View all)

Avatar
koobcamuk
93 months ago
It is about time they sorted this out. Having to constantly switch between IDs, especially when doing something such as updating or downloading a free application, is very frustrating.
Rating: 10 Votes
Avatar
Sackvillenb
93 months ago
Good

I'm glad they're working on this. It'll be useful for many people... and it's about time too!

EDIT - I wonder if they'd ever also set up a system where you could also have multiple accounts linked together... like an umbrella account with sub-accounts. I think it would be useful for families, where the spouses and kids would have separate but linked accounts... I don't know, I think that might be useful in some scenarios... maybe?
Rating: 10 Votes
Avatar
FireFish
93 months ago
Long overdue

Not only should Apple absolutely support AppleID consolidation / merging, it shocks me that they haven't yet made such a feature available to customers who buy iTunes songs and movies, ultimately licensing those media files to that particular account forever.

Personally, I have a MobileMe account I use for everything except iTunes Store. I have a separate Apple ID for that and would LOVE to merge the two.

:apple::apple:
Rating: 5 Votes
Avatar
Vip
93 months ago
Number of computers restriction...

they need to get rid of 5 "Computers" restriction, it was mainly for this reason why people choose to have (and still have) multiple apple id's.
Rating: 5 Votes
Avatar
Weaselboy
62 months ago

Hi, can we stop bumping really old threads? Make a new thread if you want to discuss it, but stop making these tragically old threads resurface.


Why create a new thread. It is a continuation of the discussion on the same topic.
Rating: 5 Votes
Avatar
PlutoPrime
93 months ago
as an atheist all I can say is AMEN!
Rating: 4 Votes
Avatar
dzigg
93 months ago
This would make me a very happy man, no more juggling with 2 accounts! ..
Rating: 3 Votes
Avatar
nunes013
93 months ago
this made me :) have been waiting for this for a while
Rating: 3 Votes
Avatar
dethmaShine
93 months ago
Lovely...

It was just yesterday when I moved my MobileMe account to iCloud. I now access Mail/Contacts/Calendar through iCloud but all the other MobileMe services still prevail until june 2012.

The problem is that I have all my apps downloaded through a gmail account; I wish I could consolidate it into my MobileMe account so that I don't have two apple accounts for the same thing.

Great that Apple's working on it and I hope the fix for the same comes before iOS 5 release.
Rating: 3 Votes
Avatar
TBRO
93 months ago

For the record, I have @mac.com and @me.com, and whether I'm using iCloud, iTunes, or whatever...it does NOT matter which ID I use.

Its one account. Just two different ways to login. If you're a MobileMe member, and the above is You Too, don't fret.


You know, I don't think this is what people are complaining about.

@mac to @me are both owned by Apple, so it's pretty understandable that they allow both IDs to be used, if you ask me.

However, like me, I think people have multiple accounts from the time they first signed up with MobileMe without having an @mac ID. Apple didn't allow you to merge MobileMe with your existing ID, so you were forced to end up with two accounts after signing up = stupid, stupid, stupid!

And now with iCloud and reports coming in of more cluttering with IDs I'm not looking forward to this unless Apple will allow merging of all my accounts to one single @me.com ID.

That's my two cents :-)
Rating: 3 Votes

[ Read All Comments ]