Can I play music on my Amazon Kindle?

One of the experimental, poorly documented features of the new Kindle operating system from Amazon is indeed the ability to play music while you're reading or otherwise using the device. You can't use Pandora or Slacker Radio, though, you need to start by uploading some mp3 files into the device then know the secret (shhh) key combination to get music started and to skip songs.

Let's start with the first step, though.

Find some mp3 format audio files on your computer (I don't think it can play WMA files, so if that's all you have, consider checking out my article How to Convert WMA to MP3 as needed).

For this test, I pulled out a folder of classic Dave Brubeck jazz, the amazing album Time Out and dropped it onto my Desktop just to make life simple.

Then I plugged my Amazon Kindle into the computer and waited for it to show up as a USB device. When it did, here's what I saw:

See that "music" folder? That's where you want to drop your mp3 files. It's smart, so I actually dragged my music folder onto the Kindle and left the individual music files within. It ended up looking like this:

Now you're ready to go. Unplug your Kindle and...

Press ALT + Space to play your music. Done? Press the same key sequence to pause the music playback.

Want to skip to the next song? That's what happens when you press ALT + F.

That should get you going. Don't forget that there's a convenient headphone jack on your Kindle too, if you don't want to bother other people as you proceed. Also, if you're a fan of podcasts, recognize that this will let you listen to podcasts on your Kindle too, if you go through the hoops of manually transferring the mp3 files.

Tip: One of the options on the "Experimental" menu is "Play MP3", but you have to quit whatever you're reading to get to the Experimental menu, so it's less helpful than the keyboard shortcuts. If you do choose it, though, here's what it'll look like:

Helpful? I hope so! Now, as you're learning more about your Kindle, why not check out the extensive Kindle help I have on this site?