iPhone: The Missing Manual, 4th Edition

Chapter 5. The iPhone as iPod

Of the iPhone’s Big Three talents—phone, Internet, and iPod—its iPoddishness may be the most successful. This function, after all, is the only one that doesn’t require the participation of AT&T and its network. It works even on planes and in subways. And of all the iPhone functions, this one gets the most impressive battery life (30 hours of music playback on the 3GS, or 40 hours on the iPhone 4).

This chapter assumes that you’ve already loaded some music or video onto your iPhone, as described in Chapter 12.

To enter iPod Land, press the Home button and then tap the orange iPod icon at the lower-right corner of the screen.

Tip

A reminder: There’s another way to get to the iPod mode. Just double-press the Home button. That opens the task switcher at the bottom of the screen. One swipe to the right, and you’re viewing the iPod playback controls, along with the icon for the iPod app itself.

List Land

The iPod program begins with lists—lots of lists. The first four icons at the bottom of the screen represent your starter lists, as follows:

Playlists

A playlist is a group of songs you’ve placed together, in a sequence that makes sense to you. One might consist of party tunes; another might hold romantic dinnertime music; a third might be drum-heavy workout cuts.

In the olden days, you could create playlists only in the iTunes software, as described on Editing and ...