This guide will teach you to jailbreak your iPod Touch. Jailbreaking is the hacking of your iPod Touch so you can run third-party applications on it.

Step 1A: Checking Firmware Version

Go to the Home Screen. Press Settings. Then press General, then About. Look for the “Version”. If it is 1.1.1, you are lucky and get to skip to step 2A. Otherwise, you will have to downgrade.

Step 1B: Getting the 1.1.1 Firmware

Use your favorite browser to download this 150 MB file, assuming you have an iPod Touch: 1.1.1 Restore File

If you have an iPhone, use this file.

Step 1C: Downgrading to 1.1.1

Put your iPod in DFU (Device Firmware Update) mode. To do this, connect it to iTunes, hold the Power and Home buttons until it disappears in iTunes, then continue to hold the Home button until iTunes recognizes it again and gives a popup saying “iTunes has detected an iPod in Recovery Mode. You must restore this iPod before you can use it.” or something like that. Then click SHIFT-Restore and choose the 1.1.1 file that you downloaded earlier. (on a Mac, it would be option-Restore) Wait for the restore to finish…

Step 2A: Jailbreaking to 1.1.1

This is the really really really easy part. If you are lazy, just stop here. Connect your iPod to a Wi-Fi network. Navigate to jailbreakme.com. Scroll down. Tap the “Install AppSnapp” thingy. Let Safari crash. It will go to the Home Screen (here on out called the SpringBoard) and show the status of the jailbreak– Downloading, jailbreaking, etc. etc. When it is done, it will go to the “Slide to Unlock screen”. When you unlock it, there should be a new application- Installer. If it doesn’t show the status, try again. For me, it takes less than a minute to jailbreak to 1.1.1.

Step 2B: Jailbreaking to 1.1.2

Before you do anything else, go into Installer, navigate to System, and click on BSD Subsystem. Install. Afterwards, press the home button. There should be a little spinning wheel icon. Then it will return to the Slide to Unlock screen. After it does that, restart your iPod. After you restart, go back into Installer, navigate to Sources, and install Community Sources. Wait for the sources to refresh. Then, go to Tweaks (1.1.1) and select OktoPrep. Install, restart, and you’re all good. Plug in the iPod/iPhone and update to 1.1.2. you can download the firmware here for iPod Touch and here for iPhone. DO NOT CLICK RESTORE!!! Now, download the zip file from here. Now, plug in your touchscreen device, close iTunes if necessary, and quit the iTunes processes (iTunesHelper.exe, iPodService.exe, etc.) Unzip the file that you downloaded, and click on “jailbreak.jar”. You will need Java installed. Do not click on the “windows.bat”, because that will only work if you have the Java SDK installed and some random path thingy done also. Wait a few minutes. Your device will reboot a few times. Now, if everything went well, your iPod should boot into 1.1.2, with Installer still on!

Step 3: Updating to 1.1.3

Before you do anything else, go to Settings-Autolock and set it to NEVER! NEVER!!!! If BSD Subsystem is uninstalled (check in Installer), install it and reboot. Or else the jailbreaking process will fail. And you don’t want that, now do you? Now, go into Installer and add the source “ijailbreak.com/repo.plist”. Let it refresh sources. Go to “Install” and the “iJailbreak” category. Install the iJailbreak 1.1.2 package.  Reboot (again). Make sure you have Wi-Fi and enough battery. Click on the iJailbreak icon. It looks like an iPhone. Wait. Wait. Wait some more. Wait even more… Take a nap. Eventually, it will finish and reboot into the 1.1.3 Home Screen, with Installer still there. Now, go back into the iJailbreak category on Installer, and install the iPod Touch Software Upgrade, obviously only if you have an iPod Touch. Go to your Home Screen, click on the iJailbreak icon. It will automatically reboot, and you will have the wiggly icons and the iPhone apps! Hooray!