Apple officially unveiled iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS Tahoe 26, watchOS 26, and tvOS 26 on Monday, immediately making betas of the new software available to developers. But, when does Apple plan to release public betas?
If you squint really hard at the end of Apple’s software press releases, Apple says that iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS Tahoe, watchOS 26, and tvOS 26 public betas will be coming “next month,” meaning July. Apple traditionally releases public betas of its new operating systems in July, and has done so for many years. This allows for a few rounds of developer-only betas to get the bugs out for a wider rollout to public beta testers.
Apple tends to make releases in the middle of the month, so the public betas will likely be released sometime around June 15. As pointed out by MacRumors, the first public betas are usually released sometime after the second or third developer beta, depending on what needs to be fixed or fine tuned.
Apple will provide public betas of iOS, iPadOS, macOS, tvOS, watchOS, HomePod Software 26, and the AirPods firmware, although it doesn’t plan to offer a visionOS public beta, and those betas will continue to be limited to developers.
Developer beta and public beta testing will continue over the summer, with the updates being released widely to the public.
