Neil Hughes
In one final death blow to the 16-gigabyte tier, Apple on Thursday tweaked the pricing and capacity of its iPod touch lineup, offering a new entry-level capacity of 32 gigabytes for $199.
The simplified product lineup also includes a high-capacity 128-gigabyte model for $299. As a result, Apple no longer offers a 64-gigabyte capacity, axing it along with the 16-gigabyte variety.
The capacity options now match Apple's entry-level iPhone SE, which also doubled capacity earlier this year in a small refresh.
The tweaked storage options for the iPod touch come about two years after the portable media player was updated with a 64-bit A8 processor. At the time, that was Apple's flagship A-series CPU, ensuring that the iPod touch could remain in the company's product lineup unchanged for some time to come.
The company took the same approach with the iPhone SE when it debuted in 2016, giving it the same A9 CPU as the then-flagship iPhone 6s. The approach allows Apple to leverage its economies of scale, and to ensure its low-end devices do not need updates as frequently as premium models.
The minor iPod touch refresh and pricing adjustment came along with the apparent discontinuation of the iPod nano and iPod shuffle.
Previously, the iPod classic was killed in 2014 after 13 years of iconic service.
With Thursday's changes, the iPod touch remains the only iPod available in Apple's product lineup. The "Pod" name won't be going away entirely, however, with Apple's forthcoming HomePod speaker bringing a new direction for the branding.
Shoppers looking to save even more on an iPod touch can take advantage of the 32GB model for $199.00 at Apple authorized reseller B&H Photo with free shipping and no sales tax collected on orders shipped outside NY and NJ. The 128GB config is also available for $299.00, also with no tax collected in 48 states.
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10 Comments
Is there ever going to be an iPod Touch+? The iPhone has had the larger screen for years now. With the death of the iPad mini, there's no other small device without phone connectivity.
This doesn't really make a lot of sense to me. At $299, they're in the same ballpark as the SE. Where the Touch could be viable is a 256GB or even a 512GB model which die-hard iPod customers would quickly snatch up to carry around their entire collections. The king of the iPods was the Classic with 160GB storage, which when factoring in iOS and basic apps, a 256GB model makes a perfect replacement. From a pure app perspective, the screens too small for most kid's gaming needs. So I'm not really sure where this falls in the product lineup going forward. I truly expected the SE to eventually drop low enough in price to make a suitable replacement for the Touch, while offering the latest technology and optional cellular use, much like the iPad does.
I bought a slightly damaged iPhone 128GB to replace my iPod classic (it doesn't yet because its music app is worse) because it was cheaper than even a used iPod touch 128GB.
The used market is another economical source for iPod replacements and an older iPhone is still a good choice for music playback especially if you need a headphone jack.
Most music players nowadays come with Bluetooth support and expandable storage via MicroSD so those discontinued Apple products were quite out of date. Apple didn't care because they weren't going to bring in much revenue to Apple even if they did have more features. I thought Apple was also going to stop making the iPod Touch because Apple isn't even updating the processors in them. I can understand that if it was just a music player but it's also used to play games. Most gaming devices have processor updates every couple of years but again Apple doesn't seem to have any interest in keeping pace with competitors. However, it is possible the A8 is powerful enough for most games. I still have three working hard-drive iPods (30, 80, 160GB) so I don't need another one. iPods are of a past era and it's definitely time for Apple to move on. No point in being nostalgic about them.