ITunes
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ITunes

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ITunes

iTunes is a media player, media library, and mobile device management (MDM) utility developed by Apple. It is used to purchase, play, download and organize digital multimedia on personal computers running the macOS and Windows operating systems, and can be used to rip songs from CDs as well as playing content from dynamic, smart playlists. It includes options for sound optimization and wirelessly sharing iTunes libraries.

iTunes was announced by Apple CEO Steve Jobs on January 9, 2001. Its original and main focus was music, with a library offering organization and storage of Mac users' music collections. With the 2003 addition of the iTunes Store for purchasing and downloading digital music, and a Windows version of the program, it became an ubiquitous tool for managing music and configuring other features on Apple's line of iPod media players, which extended to the iPhone and iPad upon their introduction. From 2005 on, Apple expanded its core music features with support for digital video, podcasts, e-books, and mobile apps purchased from the iOS App Store. Since the release of iOS 5 in 2011, these devices have become less dependent on iTunes, though it can still be used to back up their contents.

Though well received in its early years, iTunes received increasing criticism for a bloated user experience, which incorporated features beyond its original focus on music. Beginning with Macs running macOS Catalina, iTunes was replaced by separate apps, namely Music, Podcasts, and TV, with Finder taking over device management capabilities. This change did not affect iTunes running on Windows or older macOS versions. In February 2024, most features of iTunes for Windows were split into the Apple TV, Music, and Apple Devices apps. iTunes is still used for podcasts and audiobooks as there is currently no Windows version of Apple Podcasts.

SoundJam MP, released by Casady & Greene in 1999, was renamed "iTunes" when Apple purchased it the next year. The primary developers of the software moved to Apple as part of the acquisition, and simplified SoundJam's user interface, added the ability to burn CDs, and removed its recording feature and skin support. The first version of iTunes, promotionally dubbed "World's Best and Easiest To Use Jukebox Software", was announced on January 9, 2001. Subsequent releases of iTunes often coincided with new hardware devices, and gradually included support for new features, including "smart playlists", the iTunes Store, and new audio formats.

Apple released iTunes for Windows on October 16, 2003.

On April 26, 2018, iTunes was released on Microsoft Store for Windows 10, primarily to allow it to be installed on Windows 10 devices configured to only allow installation of software from Microsoft Store. Unlike Windows versions for other platforms, it is more self-contained due to technical requirements for distribution on the store (not installing background helper services such as Bonjour), and is updated automatically through the store rather than using Apple Software Update.

The role of iTunes has been replaced with independent apps, Apple Music, Apple Podcasts, Apple Books, and Apple TV; with iPhone, iPod, and iPad management integrated into the Finder starting with macOS 10.15 Catalina, and appearing as Apple Devices starting with Windows 10.

iTunes features a music library. Each track has attributes, called metadata, that can be edited by the user, including changing the name of the artist, album, and genre, year of release, artwork, among other additional settings. The software supports importing digital audio tracks that can then be transferred to iOS devices, as well as supporting ripping content from CDs. iTunes supports WAV, AIFF, Apple Lossless, AAC, and MP3 audio formats. It uses the Gracenote music database to provide track name listings for audio CDs. When users rip content from a CD, iTunes attempts to match songs to the Gracenote service. For self-published CDs, or those from obscure record labels, iTunes would normally only list tracks as numbered entries ("Track 1" and "Track 2") on an unnamed album by an unknown artist, requiring manual input of data.

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