Whatever Happened To The iPod Nano?

Even though the nano was overall a successful product for Apple, there were plenty of sore spots for the model. Many consumers reported that the screen was easily scratched, leading to, in some cases, the display becoming unreadable in a matter of days. Apple investigated these claims and found that a percentage of the iPod nanos had faulty screens. In 2005, these scratched screens led to a class-action lawsuit against Apple that suggested the company should pay $22 million in refunds to iPod nano owners. The company eventually agreed to the terms, offering users who applied a $25 refund.

Despite this and other hardware issues, the nano continued to be popular and went on to sell millions of units before slowly fading into obscurity. This was inevitable because interest in dedicated portable music devices waned as smartphones gained better music-playing capabilities. Eventually, most consumers found it unnecessary to own a separate portable device solely for playing music, and Apple ended this line of iPods, though the phone-like iPod Touch remains available to this day. Still, the nano was an iconic device for the early 2000s and arguably the most popular way to listen to music on the go at that time.