iPod shuffle

The 4th generation iPod shuffle

The iPod shuffle is an MP3 player made by Apple Inc. It's available with a 4GB memory which can hold roughly 1,000 songs, or 2GB memory holding roughly 500 songs. The iPod shuffle is Apple's smallest music player, it is 45.2mm tall, 17.5mm wide, and has a depth of 7.8mm. It was discontinued on the same day as iPod Nano, on 27 July 2017, around 3 years after iPod Classic, which was discontinued on September 9, 2014 and around 5 years before the iPod Touch, which was discontinued on May 10, 2022.

Features

Battery

The iPod shuffle's battery plays audio for 15 hours when fully charged. It can be charged to 80% of its capacity in 2 hours, and fully charged in 3 hours.

VoiceOver

The iPod shuffle is the first music player that talks to the user, using a feature called VoiceOver. When the button on the headphones is held down, VoiceOver will speak the song currently playing and its artist. If a user continues holding it, it will tell the user their playlists. They can click the centre button to select a playlist. This feature is available in 20 languages.

Colours

The iPod shuffle is available in pink, blue, green, orange, black and silver. A polished stainless steel edition is available from the online store.

History

First generation

The first iPod Shuffle was released on January 11, 2005. Steve Jobs said that people were always putting their iPods on shuffle mode and taking them to the gym and using them while they were jogging and that the iPod Shuffle lets people do that in a much more simpler way. The iPod Shuffle relies on a feature from iTunes that lets users select random songs from the iTunes library and copy them onto the Shuffle. It doesn't have a screen and doesn't have most features the other iPods have and instead of having the click wheel, the iPod Shuffle has a more basic wheel with the up and down buttons being for volume, the left and right buttons being for switching between songs and the middle button for playing and pausing. The back has a light that tells the user when the iPod has low battery.

Second Generation

The second generation iPod Shuffle was released on September 12, 2006. It's size was changed to be even smaller being the size of a square and Steve Jobs said it was the smallest MP3 player ever.

On January 30, 2007 Apple released four new colors blue, green, orange and pink as well as the normal silver color. Blue, green and pink are also the same colors used for the second generation iPod Nano and iPod Mini.

On September 5, 2007, Apple replaced the colors blue, green, orange and pink with four new colors turquoise, lavender, mint green, and Product Red.

On February 19, 2008, Apple released a 2GB iPod Shuffle for $69. On the same day Apple also lowered the price for the 1GB iPod shuffle from $79 to $49.

On September 9, 2008, Apple replaced the colors from September 2007 with colors blue, green, pink and red. They are very similar to the colors from January 2007 except slightly brighter.

The 2GB iPod Shuffle was discontinued on March 11, 2009 and the 1GB iPod Shuffle was discontinued on September 9, 2009.

Third Generation

On March 11, 2009 Apple released the third generation iPod Shuffle and is said to be "jaw-droppingly small" and "the first iPod that talks to you" and it is also the first waterproof iPod. The 3G iPod Shuffle was available in black and white. The iPod Shuffle 3G featured VoiceOver technology, a personal assistant that lets the user tell their iPod Shuffle to play a certain album, genre, artist or song. The iPod Shuffle 3rd generation no longer features controls on the device itself, but features controls on the earphones they come with.

On September 9, 2009 three new colors pink, blue and green were released and the Apple Store offered a 4GB iPod Shuffle made entirely out of stainless steel.

Fourth Generation

The fourth generation iPod Shuffle was released on September 1, 2010. The controls have been put back onto the device and it the design has been reverted to the iPod Shuffle second generation design and it now features VoiceOver in 29 languages: (Chinese (Cantonese, Mandarin), Czech, Danish, Dutch, English (Australia, UK, U.S.), Finnish, French (Canada, France), German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil, Portugal), Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Spanish (Mexico, Spain), Swedish, Thai and Turkish).

For the first two years the iPod Shuffle was sold in five colors (silver with a black control pad, green, blue, orange and pink with a white control pad) but on September 12, 2012 Apple announced the iPhone 5 and a new iPod Touch and iPod Nano, but seven new colors were announced for the iPod Shuffle (silver or black with a black control pad or green, blue, pink, yellow, and purple with a white control pad) as well as a Product Red edition with a white control pad.

Models

Generation	Image	Capacity	Colors	Connection	Original release date	Minimum OS to sync	Rated battery life (hours)
First		512 MB	White	USB (no adaptor required)	January 11, 2005	Mac: 10.2.8 Windows: 2000	audio: 12
		1 GB
		New entry-level model. Uses flash memory and has no screen.
Second		1 GB	Silver	USB 2.0 (with included dock)	September 12, 2006	Mac: 10.3.9 Windows: 2000	audio: 12
		Smaller clip design with anodized aluminum casing.
Second Early 2007 revision		1 GB	Silver Orange Green Blue Pink	USB 2.0 (with included dock)	January 30, 2007	Mac: 10.3.9 Windows: 2000	audio: 12
		Four new color options added.
Second Late 2007 revision		1 GB	Silver Light Blue Light Green Purple PRODUCT (RED) Special Edition	USB 2.0 (with included dock)	September 5, 2007	Mac: 10.4.8 Windows: 2000	audio: 12
		2 GB			February 19, 2008
		Green and blue colors changed to lighter shades, and pink and orange discontinued.
Second Late 2008 revision		1 GB	Silver Blue Green Pink PRODUCT (RED) Special Edition	USB 2.0 (with included dock)	September 9, 2008	Mac: 10.4.10 Windows: 2000	audio: 12
		2 GB
		Blue and green reverted to brighter shades and purple replaced with pink.
Third		4 GB	Silver Black	USB 2.0 (cable is included)	March 11, 2009	Mac: 10.4.11 Windows: XP	audio: 10
		Smaller design with controls relocated to right earbud cable. Two colors, and features VoiceOver. Sold concurrently with 1 GB 2G model.
Third Late 2009 revision		2 GB	Silver Black Blue Green Pink	USB 2.0 (cable is included)	September 9, 2009	Mac: 10.4.11 Windows: XP	audio: 10
		4 GB
			Polished Stainless Steel (exclusive to Apple Online and Retail Stores)
		New colors, new 4GB Apple Store Exclusive Polished metal body, and 2 GB model to replace 2G 1 GB shuffle.
Fourth		2 GB	Silver	USB 2.0 (cable is included)	September 1, 2010	Mac: 10.6, 10.7, 10.8	audio: 10
		Reverted to second generation Shuffle with controls returned to the body of the iPod. Features VoiceOver.

Timeline of iPod models and related products

See also: Timeline of full-sized iPod models and Timeline of compact iPod models

Sources: Apple press release library, Mactracker Apple Inc. model database