Given that it was just earlier this month that Apple brought changes to all three iPod lines, it’s easy to reckon that the little music player will be with us for a while yet. But is the iPod’s future really so certain? And how could the arrival of Apple Music and the Apple Watch change its course?
Though new iPod Touch, Nano and Shuffle models were released on 15 July, only the Touch saw more than cosmetic changes. The Nano has now not had any changes to its internals since 2012, while 2010 was the year in which the Shuffle’s tech specs were last modified.
Also worth considering are the arrivals of Apple Music and the Apple Watch. The former is a streaming service with the potential to beat Spotify, but will not be usable with an iPod Nano or Shuffle. Meanwhile, the Apple Watch could, judging from positive feedback among a variety of its users, grow substantially in popularity – and is arguably even easier to take around than an iPod Shuffle.
So, do the iPod’s days remain numbered? Could recent additions to Apple’s product line eventually render the iPod redundant? To read our own thoughts, check out the current issue of AppleMagazine. You can immediately have access to it on your iOS device when you subscribe now.
