Convert iTunes music to MP3 format with iTunes 11

How to convert any music you have in iTunes 11 into MP3 format, on either Windows or the Mac.

Note: this works with all iTunes songs except for songs purchased from the iTunes Store that are *not* iTunes Plus. Songs purchases in the last couple of years are likely to be iTunes Plus, but songs purchased before then have to be 'upgraded' to iTunes Plus format first.

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Hi there, this is Peter Upfold and in this
quick tutorial I'm going to show you how you
can take music in your iTunes library and
convert it into MP3 format.
And you might want to do this if you need
to transfer it to a device that doesn't support
the format that normally it would be in, if
it is in your iTunes library.
So I've got an album here, and this album
is actually in Apple Lossless format, but
I want to transfer it to a device that only
supports MP3.
So how do I do that?
Well, first of all, we need to actually go
into the iTunes preferences and set our import
settings to MP3. Now I'm doing this on a Mac,
but the process is exactly the same on Windows.
It's just that here on the Mac I go to the
iTunes menu, and click Preferences. And on
Windows, there will be a little menu button
about here which you click on and you find
Preferences.
In Preferences, you go to General, and then
click on Import Settings. And you want to
go down here and select MP3 Encoder, and you
can choose a quality setting there as well.
I then click OK, and OK.
And now what I want to do is convert these
tracks into the MP3 format. So I'm going to
click on one, hold down shift and click on
the last one to select them all at once — whoops,
hold on.
Click on the first one, hold down Shift, click
on the last one. And now I right-click and
I click on Create MP3 Version.
This is going to make copies of all of these
files in MP3 format.
So how do I work out which ones are the MP3
copies that I want to move over to my device?
Well let's go across to the Songs view, by
clicking up here on Songs. And now this still
doesn't help us very much, but if we go across
to this heading, right-click and click on
Kind, we can now click on this column heading
to sort by Kind.
So these are the original Apple Lossless files,
and these MPEG Audio Files are the MP3 files.
So again I'm going to hold down Shift and
click on the last one to select them all,
and now I can just go to a folder and I can
drag them and drop them on the folder to copy
them outside my iTunes library.
So those files will just copy. And now I could
copy those files onto my device and enjoy
those tracks in MP3 format.
What you might want to do now, is you might
want to just delete the copies here. You can
either keep the files in your iTunes library
but remove the duplicates from playback, or
you can just delete the files completely with
Move to Trash.
And then you might want to switch your import
settings back, or you might want to keep your
import settings on MP3, so that the next time
you import a CD, or indeed if you want to
right-click another track and choose Create
MP3 version you can do that at any time.
So I hope this helps you enjoy your music
in any format that you want, including MP3,
on any device that you want.