How do you delete songs from an iPod touch

June 29, 2009

“Whats the easiest way to delete or remove a song from an iPod Touch?”

Unfortunately there is no way to delete songs from the iPod touch itself. To delete songs from your iPod touch you will need to do it through iTunes. If you don’t have iTunes yet you can download if from for free from Apple at http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/.

Note: To delete songs off your iPod touch or any other iPods you will need to set your iTunes settings to “Manual” mode. You can do that in iTunes by clicking your iPod under “Devices” on the left hand side and under the Summary tab make sure “Manually manage music and videos” is checked.

Check this

Open iTunes and plug in your iPod touch.

Under “Devices” click on the iPod touch icon. Then click the side ways triangle beside your iPod touch icon.

Click on the triangle

You can now see a list of different media categories such as Music, Movies, TV Shows, Podcasts, and more. We want to delete songs from the iPod touch so select “Music” from the menu by clicking on it.

List of Media in iTunes

All your songs will be listed in the main content area. Click on the song you want to delete from your iPod touch and press the “Delete” key on your keyboard or “right click” on the song and scroll down to “Delete” to remove the song. To select multiple songs at once, hold down the “Ctrl” and click on each song. To select multiple songs in a row click on the first song to delete and hold down the “Shift” key and select the last song.

This method will only remove songs from your iPod and not your iTunes library.

Tagged as: iPod, ipod touch, itunes

{ 72 comments… read them below or add one }

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Kayla October 7, 2009 at 9:17 pm: Hi.
I followed what you said about my ipod touch and itunes, but for some reason it didnt work. I mean, the music list would come up but they were gray looking (You know when you cant click a button it is showed as gray so you know) so I clicked it anyways and clicked “delete” on my computer but it still didnt work. My brother is a newby with ipods too and he told me to delete the songs from my itunes library but the way i synked my ipod was so that i had to chose individual songs and playlists. please help me
Kayla October 7, 2009 at 9:27 pm: Hey!
I wanted to say thank you and that I found out what I was doing wrong. I didn’t have it on manually manage songs. I totally looked over that. Thank you again you were a big help and reduced a lot of stress on my part! thank you!
Tai October 8, 2009 at 7:49 am: Glad this post helped, Kayla. Enjoy the iPod touch.
Armanda October 22, 2009 at 2:55 pm: Thanks soo much for showing how to do it, other ppl were saying ‘go to itunes on ur computer ad delete the songs’ and i was like ‘waaa???’ nd then i saw this tutorial , thanks , it really helped !
Tyler November 3, 2009 at 4:28 pm: thank you so much )))
life saver
my friend put a few hundred songs on it and i wanted to delete alot i didnt like
after like deleting 20 one by one this helped me figure out how to do it all at once
thanks a ton
Ehab December 17, 2009 at 1:36 pm: Thank you so much, i was going mad if i didn’t know how to delete the songs

Thanks again
Me December 26, 2009 at 4:30 pm: Omg,thank you sooooo much!
Brooke December 27, 2009 at 9:26 pm: When I click music nothing shows up. I’ve got it set to manage music manually, and there’s almost 5 gigs of music on the iPod. Any ideas?
sarah May 14, 2010 at 5:50 pm: i am having the same problem that Kayla had.
can you help!!!
sarah May 14, 2010 at 5:52 pm: never mind i figured it out!!!!
Sonya May 25, 2010 at 3:38 pm: About what Kayla said , she could’nt select the song because it was “gray”. Thats exactly whats happening too mee.. And i know u said to set ur ipod settings to manual but i cannoott find were those settings are anywere, all i see is the “device” tab , under there is music, video and tv shows.. Im really confused

PLEASE HELP i HAVEEE to delete these songs :/
Maggie June 10, 2010 at 6:03 pm: Hi – This is what I was going to do yesterday – I set it to manual mode…but it ERASED all of my apps (luckily they are all free so far). I really want to manage my music on my Ipod but I am afraid to check manual again in case it erases everything. HELP
lyza June 14, 2010 at 3:04 am: thank you so much!
angela June 18, 2010 at 4:19 pm: i did all of your steps and delelted all the songs i didn’t want anymore. but when i plug back in my ipod in the computor it still says i have the songs on my ipod….can anyone help me?
p.s. i am new at the ipodtouch and i just got it yesterday HELP ME!
Erik June 23, 2010 at 9:28 pm: Hi.
I followed what you said about my ipod touch and itunes, but for some reason it didnt work. I mean, the music list would come up but they were gray looking (You know when you cant click a button it is showed as gray so you know) so I clicked it anyways and clicked “delete” on my computer but it still didnt work. My brother is a newby with ipods too and he told me to delete the songs from my itunes library but the way i synked my ipod was so that i had to chose individual songs and playlists. please help me
gigi July 10, 2010 at 6:10 pm: Thx sooooooooooooo much it really helped me i was trying and sooo stressed out and i got it thxxxx soooooooo much u dont kno how much i appreciate it
Melissa August 5, 2010 at 2:50 am: hello there ,, its a nice way but there is a full program who can add, delete & even copy tracks i found it on this site http://www.myipodcity.com
its name is (ipod manager) … try it
briana August 7, 2010 at 10:43 am: wow, i followed the steps, and you pretty much saved me!
thanks(:
Nikhil Khandelwal August 7, 2010 at 3:08 pm: thank you its the only one that works u fixed it
Jenna August 13, 2010 at 4:30 pm: I would just like to say thank you! I figured out how to delete the music. I had a bunch of those sample songs on my iPod from the first time I synced to my computer. I hate those! Well, thanks a billion!
lucy August 17, 2010 at 10:42 am: thankyou so much!
rey September 4, 2010 at 12:47 pm: hey thanks for your help i trie all diferents website an no results lol but i run in to this an problem solve ,one more time thanks…
sally September 6, 2010 at 5:20 am: thank you , i used this program (ipod manager) to manage my iPod Device , and it helped me a lot
Keggy September 9, 2010 at 1:16 pm: YOU ARE A LIFESAVER.
I was so freaking stressed over this cause all the other sites are talking nonsense or using different words than what I had on my iTunes window. But, yours works!!! Its so easy to follow and simple.
Thanks bunches!!
Kevin October 3, 2010 at 2:43 pm: Thanks a bunch for this info. Sorry for sameposting but yeah I hot so stressed.
But to be honest apple should include that function :/
Claire October 7, 2010 at 4:58 pm: Thanks soo much! I was nearly in tears trying to delete those songs!
Papo October 16, 2010 at 3:16 am: Thanks soooooooo much. I deleted all those from my list and my iPod Touch. Now…how can I copy and paste album art onto my Albums? For some reason, I’m connected to the internet and it doesn’t do that. Doesn’t get the album Art in there. Is there a way?
anonymous October 23, 2010 at 12:43 am: Hey, Kayla! Thanks so much for writing down what you got wrong. Turned out I did the same thing and I was really confused but what you found out did me a LOT of help. Thank you so much again. You’re a real lifesaver.
lisa November 10, 2010 at 12:41 pm: I have 2 itouches and one ipod on my comuter, when I am on the screen with my daughters itouch and manually is checked and I delete items, do I press sync in the botton right of the screen? I don’t want to do this and sync all of my/my sons stuff onto her itouch? help….we are getting the ipad soon. Apple makes this too difficult!
Meaghan November 28, 2010 at 6:50 am: Where can I find the devices tab on my ipod?
AB December 16, 2010 at 12:37 pm: thank you very much i was so confused but this helped so much thank you !!!
brent December 20, 2010 at 6:19 pm: i have a man crush now. thank you so very much. i was ready to throw computer and ipod into street before finding you straight forward simple process..
Jess December 25, 2010 at 8:53 pm: OMG, thankyou so much! I downloaded a dirty song by mistake and freaked out, but you saved me!! I will be using you all the time from now on!! THANKYOU!
Jess December 25, 2010 at 8:59 pm: Hey, I have one question: You don’t get your money back, do you? It’s just that my sister says I should, but my mum says I don’t… it’s a bit confusing!!
mickymouse December 25, 2010 at 9:01 pm: Yay finally! thankyou soooo much
lauren January 18, 2011 at 4:37 pm: hi!! im lauren and i have alott of songs i want to delete of of my ipod,and i followed the tutorial, but it didnt work, and im on an apple computer,didnt know if that made a difference???
Ali January 22, 2011 at 11:48 am: Hi
Thank you very mush. you guys saved me from a very big pain
Thanks again
Ali
sophie January 29, 2011 at 12:57 pm: hiiiiiiiii ty 4 that realy needed o delete some song no in my house knew how to ….ha :)):):);)
Zoe January 30, 2011 at 8:59 pm: Thank youso much! I went to a bunch of websites to find out how to delete songs but none of them told me how to do it ‘manualy’. Thanks again!
Megan February 6, 2011 at 3:36 pm: this worked really well !!!
Danni February 6, 2011 at 6:27 pm: What happens when you uncheck the manually manage songs? does it just go back to doing whatever it wants?
Izzie February 18, 2011 at 2:29 pm: Hi I just wanna ask do you have to do this on the computer or can you delete songs on your iPod touch?
Cindy February 20, 2011 at 11:34 am: I went step by step to the directions and the items are still on my Ipod touch, they are gone from my library so I can’t see them, but they refuse to go away when synching….any other ideas?
Aron February 22, 2011 at 5:08 pm: Thank you dude! I ve been serchin for this info for a while! You helped me a lot! keep it up!
Kevin February 24, 2011 at 3:37 pm: Thanks
Kaitlen "TWI-HARD" March 1, 2011 at 5:18 pm: hello you helped me out SOO much!!! I didnt know how to delete songs from my ipod touch and now i do thanks!!!
Deanna March 3, 2011 at 10:37 pm: Um , Can anyone help me , i did just what it said , but if i right click it doesn’t come up with delete and when i press delete on the keyboard it doesn’t delete , please hepl , thanks.
sarah March 11, 2011 at 4:48 pm: i was getting realy upset thank youuu so muchh !!!!! peolple
Sarah Harb March 24, 2011 at 2:45 pm: Thanks So Much! This Helped Me Alot!!! Especially Because It Was Detailed. (:
izzy March 27, 2011 at 10:46 am: thank you i been everywhere to try to find how to delete music from my ipod and everyone gave me a long explanation that didnt even work so thank you