How to Set Up Audiobooks in ITunes

Since the creation of the iPod around the turn of the 21st century, the way that consumers use this revolutionary device has grown in amazing ways. Apple has continuously pushed the limits of the iPod to bring greater and greater entertainment value to its customers. One of the ways in which consumers can now enjoy their iPod is listening to audiobooks. The iTunes Store, Audible and other services sell electronic audiobooks which can be downloaded and will go directly into the iTunes audiobook section and can then be synchronized with the user's iPod. But there is no doubt that you may have some audiobooks on CD or in mp3 format that you wish to load into iTunes. By default the importation of these files will simply go into your Music section of iTunes and it can be nearly impossible to figure out how to get them to show up as actual audiobooks in the Audiobooks section of iTunes. I want to show you how you can import your audiobooks from CD or mp3 into iTunes and have them show up in the Audiobooks section of iTunes so that you can properly manage them.

Getting Your Audiobooks from CD

To get your audiobooks from compact disc into your iTunes Audiobooks library you will begin by importing the content from the CD just like any music CD. But before you insert the CD, you will need to change your preferences so that iTunes will import the content in the AAC format. This is essential for this process to work. Go to Preferences from the iTunes pull-down menu (Mac) or under the Edit pull-down menu (Windows). From the General tab select "Import Settings" and then choose "AAC Encoder" from the "Import Using:" drop-down menu. Select OK to confirm.

Now import the tracks from your book's CD. Chances are there will be multiple tracks and perhaps multiple discs. Simply import them all. It may help to put them all on a playlist so that you can organize them which will useful later in the process. Once they are all imported in the AAC format it is just a matter of adjusting a few settings. First you will want to give the tracks meaningful names. This will allow you to be able to tell iTunes that those tracks are part of the same audiobook. Select the first track of the book, right-click and select "Get Info". For the first track, for Name, enter the title of the book followed by 01/X where X equals the total number of tracks. The next track's name will be title of the book forllowed by 02/3. The double digit for the first number is essential allowing iTunes to properly sort the tracks by title and in the right order. Put the book's author in the Artist field, and the title of the book in the Album field. Enter the track Number also. If you desire to put any Comments (such as name of the narrator) do that here. Finally select Audiobook for the Genre. Finish up by clicking OK or click Next to proceed to the next track. This can no doubt be time consuming but it is necessary.

Importing and Converting Mp3's Into Audiobooks in iTunes

If the tracks you have are already on your computer in mp3 format, you can still convert them using iTunes. Once you get the mp3's into iTunes simply highlight all of the tracks for the audiobook, right-click, and select "Create AAC" and iTunes will do the work for you. After it has finished you can delete the mp3 versions from your Library to avoid confusion. Now go through the same process of change the tracks' Get Info information as was mentioned in the previous section.

Create your audiobook

Once you have adjusted all of the Get Info data for your tracks, it is now a cinch to get the tracks into the audiobooks section of iTunes. Select all of the tracks for that audiobook, right-click and select Get Info, and from under the Options tab change the Media Kind to "Audiobook". Select Ok. You can now click on Audiobooks in the iTunes sidebar and you will see the icon for your audiobook. At this point you can get album artwork for your audiobook, sort by Artists (i.e. authors) and genres, and sync your audiobook to your iPod.

I hope this helps you to be able to sort and manage your audiobooks better in iTunes. Leave a comment and let me know how it is working out for you and also share with me and the other readers other ways you have for managing audiobooks in iTunes and on the iPod. Good luck!