Troubleshooting missing iPhone/iPad, iPod Touch functionality in new iTunes 12.13.9.1 under Windows 11 25H2 (works with iOS26.x & iPadOS26.x)

Key Takeaways

• New iTunes versions (like 12.13.9.1) can dynamically remove features if an iPhone isn’t recognized during installation. Which can be a problem is iPhone detection is a bit wonky, as in my case with a new PC freshly built in May 2025 and freshly installed Windows 11 (had to install it twice!).

• Old drivers can persist in Windows even if the software was never installed. (in my case Apple iPhone drivers of Tenorshare Inc., despite I never had their 3rd party iPhone Management Software installed on this machine.

• It can happen that updating to newer iTunes versions like 12.13.9.1 and up, still causes the iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch functionality being removed from iTunes. it can be safely skipped for now, as long as iTunes works and the iPhone is recognized. However, future iOS updates might eventually require a newer iTunes version.
  
  
  Step-By-Step instructions how to go about

1. Identified the problem:
   • Windows had an old Tenorshare driver (oem11.inf) in its driver store.
   • This caused iTunes to fail to detect the iPhone correctly.
   • So, I uninstalled the new iTunes 12.13.9.1 (release date 2025-10-15) and downloaded previous version iTunes 12.10.11 (release date March 08, 2024, changelog / alternative download)
   • faced error message “Can’t read iTunes library because it was created by a newer version”
   • Went to my iTunes music folder (usually):
     
     C:\Users\<yourname>\Music\iTunes\
     Renamed
     iTunes Library.itl → iTunes Library (newer).itl
     Started iTunes 12.12.10.1 again.
2. Driver cleanup:
   • Used pnputil in the Administrator Command Prompt to list with pnputil /enum-drivers
   • Found it’s driver “oem11.inf” in my case
   • Removed Tenorshare drivers: pnputil /delete-driver oem11.inf /uninstall /force
   • After removal, Windows correctly used the Apple driver (from 2017) for the iPhone when I reconnected my iPhone.
3. Ensuring iTunes recognition:
   • Restarted the Apple Mobile Device Service to fix “No iPhone found” in iTunes.
   • Confirmed that the iPhone is recognized properly after reconnecting.

TL;DR: The older iTunes version 12.10.11 works better with iPhones on Windows 11, since newer versions disable device support if no iPhone is connected during installation.