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iPod is a brand of portable media players designed and marketed by Apple and launched in 2001. Devices in the iPod range are primarily digital music players, designed around a central click wheel — although the iPod shuffle has buttons only. As of October 2005, the line-up consists of the video-capable fifth generation iPod, the smaller iPod nano, and the display-less iPod shuffle. The full-sized model stores media on an internal hard drive, while the smaller iPod nano and iPod shuffle use flash memory. Like many digital audio players, iPods can also serve as external data storage devices. In January 2007, Apple announced the iPhone, a device that combined the features of the video-capable iPod with mobile phone and mobile Internet capabilities.

Apple's iTunes software is used to transfer music to the devices. As a free jukebox application, iTunes stores an entire music library on the user's computer and can play, burn, and rip music from a CD. It can also transfer photos, videos, games and calendars to the models that support them.

Apple focused its development on the iPod's unique user interface and its ease of use, rather than on technical capability. From October 2004, the iPod became the world's best-selling range of digital audio players and its worldwide mainstream adoption made it one of the most popular consumer brands. Some of Apple's design choices and proprietary actions have, however, led to criticism and legal battles.

Since October 2004, the iPod has dominated digital music player sales in the United States, with over 90% of the market for hard drive-based players and over 70% of the market for all types of players.[47] During the year from January 2004 to January 2005, the high rate of sales caused its U.S. market share to increase from 31% to 65% and in July 2005, this market share was measured at 74%. The release of the iPod mini helped to ensure this success at a time when competing flash-based music players were once dominant.[48] On 8 January 2004, Hewlett-Packard (HP) announced that they would sell HP-branded iPods under a license agreement from Apple. Several new retail channels were used — including Wal-Mart — and these iPods eventually made up 5% of all iPod sales. In July 2005, HP stopped selling iPods due to unfavorable terms and conditions imposed by Apple.[49]

According to Apple's quarterly financial results (from 2002 Q1 to 2007 Q1), total iPod sales reached 88,701,000 units as of January 2007. Apple's fiscal year ends in September. In January 2007, Apple reported record annual earnings of US$7.1 billion, of which 48% was made from iPod sales.[50] Apple and several industry analysts suggest that iPod users are likely to purchase other Apple products such as Mac computers