Is it possible to uninstall or disable iTunes in OS X?

Question

iTunes is always popping up on my HTPC Mac Mini and I don't use it. It is running Snow Leopard if that makes any difference to the solution

Solution 1

Of course, check out the Apple support article, Removing iTunes for Mac OS X . (note: no longer links to the expected article, appears to have been removed.)

UPDATE: Here's an article for removing iTunes in Lion.

Solution 2

If you want to just disable it, run sudo chmod -x /Applications/iTunes.app
It won't work anymore.

If you want it back, just sudo chmod +x /Applications/iTunes.app

On more recent versions of macOS, you may need to disable SIP:

1. Power off your device
2. Power on your device while maintaining ⌘ and R pressed
3. Once you reach the recovery system, select Terminal from the Utilities menu
4. Type csrutil disable and then reboot

If you want to revert that back to the original protection, run the same steps but replace with csrutil enable at step 4.

Check the current status with csrutil status in any terminal window.

Comments

[Paul Lockwood]

Could have been DVDs left in the drive. Also it started up when charging an iPod. I sync the iPod with a different machine but we tend to charge things off the htpc because it is always on

[Dustin]

If you are charging an iPod/iPhone/etc, just turn off the "Automatically sync when connected" in iTunes for that particular iPod... That would prevent it from starting up when you plug in the iPhone/iPod.

[Canadian Luke]

Whilst this may theoretically answer the question, it would be preferable to include the essential parts of the answer here, and provide the link for reference.

[lzam]

Can you specify which terminal command you are referring to?

[spume]

I've known iTunes to fire up when the play/pause button on a keyboard is used, and when an Apple IR remote is used.

[spume]

This is a neat, non-destructive solution.

[lfender6445]

thanks for this - iTunes is far too invasive, this is just what I needed

[damd]

Good solution, only downside is that App Store keeps trying to update iTunes even though it's already updated :(

[Benoit Duffez]

@damd: I haven't had this issue, what is your OS? I'm on the latest Sierra and iTunes gets updated only when the app store has an update for it.

[1.21 gigawatts]

I think you should be able to uninstall, disable, and define privileges on ALL software like you can on apps and all apps should run without those privileges. The main one is to disable network access per app. I write software for a living and it's a security breach to not have control of the system privileges apps have. In fact, other apps should be able to take part in SIP.

[Vadorequest]

Under Catalina, you have to disable SIP indeed. totalfinder.binaryage.com/sip provides a good enough (visual) tutorial.