Produced by the band's guitarist, Jimmy Page, it was recorded between December 1970 and February 1971, mostly in the country house Headley Grange.

Unlike the prior two albums, the band was joined by guest musicians: the singer Sandy Denny on "The Battle of Evermore", and the pianist Ian Stewart on "Rock and Roll".

Following the release of Led Zeppelin III in October 1970, the group took a break from live performances to concentrate on recording a follow-up.

[9] The guitarist and producer Jimmy Page later recalled: "We needed the sort of facilities where we could have a cup of tea and wander around the garden and go in and do what we had to do.

"[10] This relaxed, atmospheric environment at Headley Grange also provided other advantages for the band, as they were able to capture spontaneous performances immediately, with some tracks arising from the communal jamming.

[10] The bassist and keyboardist John Paul Jones remembered there was no bar or leisure facilities, but this helped focus the group on the music without being distracted.

The band spent five days at Island, before Page then took the multitrack tapes to Sunset Sound in Los Angeles for mixing on 9 February, on Johns' recommendation, with a plan for an April 1971 release.

The track featured a duet between Plant and Fairport Convention's Sandy Denny,[17][b] who provided the only female voice to be heard on a Led Zeppelin recording.

[19] Plant played the role of narrator in the song, describing events, while Denny sang the part of the town crier representing the people.

[18] "Stairway to Heaven" was mostly written by Page and most of the chord sequence was already worked out when recording started at Basing Street Studios.

The basic backing track featured Bonham on drums, Jones on electric piano and Page on acoustic guitar.

[20] The whole group contributed to the arrangement, such as Jones playing recorders on the introduction and Bonham's distinctive drum entry halfway through the piece.

[21] The song was considered the standout track on the album and was played on FM radio stations frequently, but the group resisted all suggestions to release it as a single.

The track opened with Bonham's heavy unaccompanied drumming, which was recorded in the lobby of Headley Grange using two Beyerdynamic M 160 microphones suspended above a flight of stairs; output from these were passed to a limiter.

[30] Three other songs from the sessions, "Down by the Seaside", "Night Flight" and "Boogie with Stu" (featuring Stewart on piano), were included four years later on the double album Physical Graffiti.

[5] The record company were strongly against the idea, but the group stood their ground and refused to hand over the master tapes until their decision had been agreed to.

While most commonly called Led Zeppelin IV, Atlantic Records catalogues have used the names Four Symbols and The Fourth Album.

[5] Jones' symbol, which he chose from Rudolf Koch's Book of Signs, is a single circle intersecting three vesicae piscis (a triquetra).

It represents the triad of mother, father and child, but, also happens to be the logo for the steel and armament producer Krupp and, turned upside down, Ballantine beer.

[5] A fifth, smaller symbol chosen by guest vocalist Sandy Denny represents her contribution to "The Battle of Evermore"; the figure, composed of three equilateral triangles, appears on the inner sleeve of the LP, serving as an asterisk.

[37] During Led Zeppelin's tour of the United Kingdom in winter 1971 shortly after the album's release, the symbols could be seen on the group's stage equipment; Page's on one of his amplifiers, Bonham's on his bass drum head, Jones' on a covering for his Rhodes piano, and Plant's on the side of a PA cabinet.

[38][39] The picture on the front of the album of an old man carrying a bundle of sticks on his back was bought in an antique shop in Reading, Berkshire by Plant.

Research in 2023 suggests that the image, which had previously been described as an oil painting, is a black and white photograph dating to 1892 which had been hand-coloured.

[43] Page has explained that the cover of the fourth album was intended to bring out a city/country dichotomy that had initially surfaced on Led Zeppelin III, and a reminder that people should look after the Earth.

[50][51][c] "Ultimately", writes Lewis, "the fourth Zeppelin album would be the most durable seller in their catalogue and the most impressive critical and commercial success of their career".

The reissue was released with an inverted colour version of the original album's artwork as its bonus disc's cover.

[53] In a contemporary review for Rolling Stone, Lenny Kaye called it the band's "most consistently good" album yet and praised the diversity of the songs: "out of eight cuts, there isn't one that steps on another's toes, that tries to do too much all at once.

[74] Robert Christgau originally gave Led Zeppelin IV a lukewarm review in The Village Voice,[75] but later called it a masterpiece of "heavy rock".

[63] In his album guide to heavy metal, Spin magazine's Joe Gross cited Led Zeppelin IV as a "monolithic cornerstone" of the genre.

[80] Led Zeppelin's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame biography described the album as "a fully realized hybrid of the folk and hard-rock directions".