iPod touch (1st generation)

The iPod touch (1st generation) cost $299 and put the iPhone’s screen and software into an iPod, four months after the iPhone itself had gone on sale. The 3.5-inch display ran at 480 by 320 and took up most of the front, with one button below it and nothing else.

Wi-Fi went into an iPod for the first time here. Safari came with it, along with YouTube, and the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store meant music could be browsed and bought on the device rather than on a computer first. Apple arranged free Wi-Fi in Starbucks shops across the US from the following month so people would do exactly that.

What it did without was as telling as what it had. There was no speaker, no camera and no Bluetooth, and the sounds it made outside the headphones came from a small buzzer. At 8mm thick Apple called it the thinnest iPod yet, and the battery ran to 22 hours of music or five of video.

It went on sale in 8GB and 16GB versions at $299 and $399, and a 32GB model followed in February 2008 at $499. Steve Jobs called it a landmark iPod that ushered in a whole new generation of features.

It was announced on 5 September 2007 at the ‘The Beat Goes On’ event. It reached shops nine days later on 14 September, priced from $299.

Read about the iPod nano (3rd generation) announced on the same day.