Every iPod is equipped with a lithium-ion, rechargeable battery, whose life—the amount of time your iPod will play before it needs to be recharged—varies by iPod model (see the documentation included with your iPod for specifics). While each iPod battery has a playback time expectancy, it will be affected by your iPod use and its settings.
To ensure that you get the most out of your iPod battery, be sure to incorporate these tips in your day-to-day play to optimize your battery life. (For more information about iPod batteries, be sure to check out the "iPod battery FAQ," "Caring for iPod's battery," and "Accurately determine your iPod battery life" pages.)
Use the Latest Software
Make it a point to use Software Update if you're using a Mac—this ensures updates to both your Mac and your iPod. You can also use the new "Check for Updates" menu option—under iTunes on a Mac and Help on Windows—to update both iTunes and iPod. Or, on either Mac or PCs, check the iPod Settings Summary tab in iTunes 7 when you sync your iPod. If new iPod software is available, the Update button will be available—black.
If the Update button is black, just click it, and iTunes will take care of updating your iPod for you. As Apple engineers find new ways of optimizing battery performance, they will include this in new updates.
Put It on Hold
When you're not using your iPod, move the switch to the Hold position so that you don't inadvertently power on your player or wake it from sleep when it's in transit (this doesn't affect iPod shuffle owners).
When you see color next to the Hold switch, you know your iPod is on Hold.
Let the Music Play
Because iPod batteries are lithium-based, try to use your iPod regularly to keep the electrons moving. Try to go through at least one charge cycle a month.
Beat the Heat
To avoid battery degradation, keep your iPod away from extreme heat (such as leaving it locked in a hot car) and prolonged exposure to direct sunlight. You wouldn't do this to your pets or kids—apply the same care to your iPod. Ideally, try to use your iPod in places that are around room temperature.
Prepare to Pause
Avoid abandoning your iPod, leaving it to play alone all by itself. If you're stepping out without it—even for a moment—press the Play/Pause button to pause playback. Otherwise your iPod will continue to happily play songs until the battery drains.
Lessen the Light
Backlighting (on iPods with a display) will eat away at your battery life—especially if you use it excessively. If you don't need to have the backlighting turned on for as long as it's currently set, or you want to turn it off completely, choose Settings > Backlight Timer, then either choose a shorter time interval that allows you enough time to read the screen, or choose Off to disable the feature.
Shorten the amount of time that the Backlight shines to preserve your battery life.
Lower the Brightness
On Fifth Generation iPods the settings menu contains a Brightness option. Turning down the brightness will also increase battery life. You can check out “Adjusting brightness on the fifth generation iPod” for more help with the brightness control.
Terminate the Equalizer
On iPods with a display, using Equalizer settings with your music makes your iPod processor work harder because the effect isn't encoded in the song. This, in turn, will impact your battery life. If your battery power is dwindling down, you can eke more life out of it by turning off the EQ; just choose Settings > EQ > Off.
Don't Skip Around
Avoid using the Next/Fast-forward and Previous/Rewind buttons to hear what you want to hear. This causes your iPod to access the hard drive more frequently, which uses more battery power. Instead, create playlists of the songs you want to hear and in the order you want to hear them to keep you from pressing those buttons.
Make an Impression with Compression
Your iPod cache works most efficiently with songs that have been compressed to under 9 MB (megabytes). Large files or uncompressed files (such as AIFF or WAV) will cause your iPod to fill its cache more frequently, which will have an impact on your battery life. Use the AAC or MP3 encoder in iTunes to compress your music files before transferring them to your iPod. If you have songs that are long in length, consider breaking them up into multiple shorter tracks with shorter files sizes for optimum efficiency.
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