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How to Import Audiobooks into iTunes?

Importing Audiobooks

iTunes also allows you to import your own audiobooks into your iTunes library in much the same way as for your own music tracks. Older versions of iTunes made importing these audiobooks into the proper section in iTunes a relatively cumbersome process involving external conversion tools, but the good news is that as of iTunes 8 it has become considerably simpler to do.

With iTunes 8 and later, audiobooks can be imported into iTunes in any supported audio format. These files will end up in your “Music” section by default, but you can easily categorize them as Audiobooks simply by selecting the newly-imported tracks and choosing File, Get Info from the iTunes menu. This brings up the track information dialog box. From the Options tab, you merely need to change the “Media Kind” field to “Audiobook.”

Note that you may also want to enable the options for Remember playback position and Skip when shuffling as shown above. These settings are enabled by default for audiobooks purchased from the iTunes Store and allow you to resume listening to your audiobooks where you left off either in iTunes or on your iPod, iPhone or Apple TV. Further, this playback position will be synced between all devices that are automatically syncing with your iTunes library, allowing you to begin listening to your audiobook on your iPod, for example, then pick up where you left off on your computer after syncing your iPod.

The Skip when Shuffling option is similarly desirable to prevent audiobooks from coming up when shuffling large music playlists or the entire content of your iPod.

Both of these options are actually forced on for content purchased from the iTunes Store or Audible.com and you actually won’t be able to turn them off. Further, audiobooks that were manually converted to the M4B format to be imported into older versions of iTunes will also inherit these settings.

Another advantage of having your own audiobooks listed in the proper “Audiobooks” section is that you will be able to vary the playback speed for your audiobooks on your iPod or iPhone.

Note that some audiobooks that you obtain from other sources may consist of multiple files for each chapter of the audiobook. If you are importing an audiobook from CD, you can easily join the tracks together into a single audio file in iTunes itself by using the Join CD Tracks option found on the iTunes Advanced menu when importing the CD. To do this, simply select all of the tracks on the CD within iTunes and then choose Advanced, Join CD Tracks from the iTunes menu.

When importing the CD, the selected tracks will be joined together and imported as a single audio file in your default import format. Note that this will not add any chapter markers to your imported audiobook however, so you may want to look at a third-party utility for this purpose. There are a couple of good software utilities that can merge multiple-file audiobooks into a single file for you and convert them into a proper audiobook with chapter markers. Two good third-party tools for this purpose are DVD Ripper Pack for Mac for Mac users, or Cucusoft Ultimate DVD+Video Converter Suite for Windows users. Both of these tools can handle the entire process of joining separate audiobook files together, converting them into an iTunes-ready audiobook file and importing them right into your iTunes library.

Managing Audiobooks

Once in your iTunes library, management of audiobooks is relatively straightforward. The Audiobooks category in the iTunes source list will display a view of all of the audiobooks in your library which may be shown as a list or in Grid or Cover Flow views. Grid View has the advantage of automatically grouping multi-file audiobooks into a single entry, based upon the Album tag.

Other than their placement in a separate category, audiobooks are managed in much the same way as music tracks, and can be sorted, re-tagged and organized in the same manner.

Synchronizing Audiobooks

Synchronization of audiobooks to your iPod, iPhone or Apple TV is similarly straightforward. iTunes does not provide any audiobook-specific synchronization options, instead choosing to include your audiobook sync options alongside the options for syncing music content. For the iPhone and iPod, an “Audiobooks” playlist can be found at the top of the Playlists section. Selecting this will simply sync ALL audiobooks in your iTunes library onto your iPod or iPhone.

Alternatively, you can build your own playlists of audiobook content and select them for synchronization with your iPod or iPhone, or select audiobooks by the “Artist” or “Genre” fields in your iTunes sync settings. If you’re managing the content on your iPod or iPhone manually, the same rules as for management of music tracks also apply—simply drag-and-drop your audiobooks from your iTunes library onto your iPod or iPhone in this case. Protected audiobooks purchased from the iTunes Store have the same limitations as other iTunes DRM-protected files: They may be synced to any number of iPod or iPhone devices from one of your five authorized computers, but you can only store content from up to five iTunes Store accounts on any single device. Audiobooks purchased from Audible.com work in a similar manner, although the limits in this case are a maximum of three iTunes computers and a maximum of two different Audible.com accounts per device.

The Apple TV is a bit of a special case when it comes to audiobooks. Firstly, you will not find an “Audiobooks” playlist in the Apple TV sync settings. To synchronize audiobooks to your Apple TV, you will either need to sync all content from your iTunes library, or build playlists for your audiobooks and select these playlists for synchronization. That said, however, any audiobooks in your back-end iTunes library will be accessible on your Apple TV as long as iTunes is running and you have not opted to only show the items synced on the Apple TV in your Apple TV sync preferences.

The other limitation with audiobooks on the Apple TV pertains to content from Audible.com. For whatever reason, the Apple TV does not support Audible.com audiobooks at all, and you will not be able to transfer these audiobooks to the Apple TV or play them on the Apple TV from your iTunes library. Only audiobooks that you have purchased from the iTunes Store or imported from other sources can be transferred to the Apple TV.

Audiobooks with Remember Playback Position enabled will also sync their current playback position between iTunes and any other devices using automatic synchronization. Note that purchased audiobooks and audiobooks converted to the M4B format via third-party tools will have this option permanently enabled.

Varying Playback Speed

On the iPhone and iPod you can adjust the playback speed for your audiobooks. This option is found under Settings, Audiobooks on the iPod classic, Settings, Playback, Audiobooks on the current iPod nano models. On the iPhone and iPod touch, you can adjust the speed of audiobooks during playback by tapping the screen to bring up the extra controls and tapping the “1X” button in the top-right corner to toggle between double-speed playback, half-speed playback, or normal speed playback.

When you are finished the audiobook will not only be in the proper track order which allows you to play the chapters in order, but the audiobook will be labeled and easy to find. Just enjoy it!