How to Remove the Photo Album Artwork on iTunes

Removing album artwork in iTunes can save valuable space on your iPod.

Album artwork can make sifting through a large iTunes music library a much more enjoyable process, akin to browsing at a record shop. However, album artwork comes at a price. Each image embedded in a music file requires disk space. For those limited by small computer hard drives or small capacity mp3 players, deleting artwork from songs' metadata can save valuable drive space. Thankfully, iTunes makes deleting album artwork a simple process.

Instructions

1. Choose the song with artwork you wish to delete in iTunes. With the song selected, go to the "file" menu and select "get info," or press "Control-I" in Windows or "Command-I" on the Mac to get info on the song.

2. Select the "artwork" tab in the song info window. Highlight the artwork in the artwork window and press the "delete" button. Then press the "OK" button. This deletes the artwork in an individual track.

3. Deleting artwork in multiple tracks is just as simple. Select multiple songs by holding down the "control" key while selecting songs. Select a range of songs, as in an album, by choosing the first song and then, while holding down the "shift" key, choosing the last song in the collection.

4. Go to the "file" menu and select "get info" on the tracks you have selected. If iTunes asks you if you wish to edit information for multiple items, choose "yes."

5. Click on the "info" tab if it is not already selected. Place a check in the check box next to the blank artwork window and press "OK." This deletes the artwork in the selected music files.

Tips & Warnings

• According to the MAC OS X Hints website, iPods store album artwork in a separate database, not from the actual song files. So if you need to reclaim space on an iPod, connect your iPod to iTunes and in the iPod preferences, uncheck the "display album art" option.

• An easier way to remove any downloaded artwork in music files is to select the music files in iTunes, right-click with the mouse and choose "clear downloaded artwork." This clears only artwork you have downloaded and added to the files. It does not clear artwork that was embedded in the music's metadata from the iTunes store.

• Deleting artwork from music files in iTunes is irreversible. If you're having second thoughts about losing all the artwork, make a backup of your iTunes library before deleting the artwork from the iTunes database.

References

• Mac OS X Hints: Free Up Extra iPod Space by Removing Artwork

Resources

• Mac Observer: Removing iTunes Artwork