But as great as new features are, they don’t make up for bugs and instability. If you’re finding the iOS 26 beta too temperamental to handle right now, you can downgrade back to iOS 18—but the process might not be painless.
Why you shouldn’t install betas
At the risk of lecturing, I want to take a moment to talk about why I don’t think most of us should be running betas on our iPhones—especially this latest beta. The point of a beta is to test a piece of software before it launches to the general public. Testers note the bugs and glitches they run into, and software developers fix those problems. Once the developers think they’ve run through enough testing, then they release the software to the public.
That means with each update, the beta gets more and more stable. There are no guarantees when it comes to betas, but if you’re going to jump on one, I recommend joining as late as possible to bypass the worst of the bugs. (Apple plans a public beta release for July.) As of this writing, iOS 26 is on it’s first beta, and a developer beta, no less. It’s a version Apple releases for software developers to test their apps with, and not the general pool of users who are interested in trying features out early. iOS 26 will likely never be this buggy and unstable again, and while anyone with the know-how can get their compatible iPhone running the beta, it’s risky.
(Apple used to require users to have a paid developer account to access the developer beta, which cut down on the number of general users accessing them. But in recent years, it has been possible to sign into Apple Developer with your Apple Account to gain free to access developer betas. I don’t think that’s a great idea, but seeing as people used to download IPSW files from shady sites to access developer betas early, Apple probably made a decision in the name of security—if determined users are going to do it anyway, might as well allow them to officially download the dev beta.)
Where the real trouble starts is when you decide you want to uninstall the beta from your iPhone. It’s possible, but it’s a pain: The only way to uninstall the iOS 26 beta and downgrade to iOS 18 is to restore your iPhone to factory settings. A simple reset won’t do: You need to perform a full restore to wipe everything from your device, then reinstall the latest version of iOS 18. There’s no guarantee this will work, either, as you could run into any number of errors—though Apple has steps on what to do should you encounter them.
Don’t uninstall the beta if you don’t have a proper backup
If you have a proper backup, you’ll be able to retrieve your data. The keyword here is “proper.” Your backup cannot be from a newer version of iOS than your iPhone is running, which means you can’t downgrade to iOS 18 if you only have backups made on iOS 26. If you rely on iCloud for backups, this gets tricky: The service backs up your iPhone automatically, and overwrites the previous backup each time. If your iPhone made an iCloud backup while running the iOS 26 beta, you no longer have an iCloud backup from iOS 18, and thus cannot restore from iCloud once you uninstall the beta.
That’s why Apple recommends you back up your iPhone to a computer before installing a beta: These backups are made manually, and are not overwritten by future backups. As such, it’s the much safer option for restoring when downgrading.
My advice? Check if your iPhone made an iCloud backup since you installed the beta from Settings > [Your Name] > iCloud > iCloud Backup. If the last backup was made prior to the installation, disable iCloud backups to ensure no backup is made while running iOS 26. If it did backup since running iOS 26, and you don’t have another backup option, do not proceed unless you’re okay with losing all of the local data not tied to your Apple Account or other accounts you have logged into your iPhone. (It’s really not worth installing betas, you guys.) Unless your iPhone cannot function on iOS 26, you’re better off living with the beta until things get more stable, rather than risk losing data to go back to iOS 18.
Downgrading your iPhone from iOS 26 to iOS 18
To start, you’ll need a Mac running the latest released version of macOS (not macOS Tahoe, mind you), or a Windows PC running the latest version of Apple Devices. You cannot uninstall iOS 26 without a computer. If you wipe your iPhone from the on-device Settings app, your iPhone will boot into iOS 26 with all of its data erased.
Next, plug your iPhone into your computer, then put it into recovery mode. You can do so with the following steps:
Press and release the volume up button.
Press and release the volume down button.
Press and hold the side button, and only let go once you see the recovery mode screen (your screen will go dark and you’ll see the Apple logo first—keep holding it).
Wait for the Restore option to appear on your computer, then click it. Your computer will then erase your iPhone, and automatically install the latest non-beta version of iOS. (At this time, that would be iOS 18.5.) Apple warns that this process can fail, in which case your device will exit recovery mode. If so, let the download finish, then put your iPhone back into recovery mode and try again. If you run into a specific error code when attempting to restore, locate it on Apple’s support page and try to troubleshoot the issue.
If the restore completes as expected, you might need to sign into your Apple Account. This disables Activation Lock, which will let you proceed.
Restoring your iPhone’s data after uninstalling iOS 26
At this point, assuming everything went according to plan, you have a blank iPhone running the latest version of iOS 18. If you have that proper backup described above, you can restore it during the setup process.
To do so, go through the setup steps until you reach the “Transfer Your Apps & Data” page. Here, you can restore your iPhone from an iCloud backup, or a backup from your Mac or PC. Again, this backup needs to be compatible with the latest version of iOS 18 you’re running. If it is, Apple will walk you through the steps to restore it. (Just make sure if you choose to restore from a Mac or PC that you connect your iPhone to the computer that contains your backup before proceeding.)
This articles is written by : Nermeen Nabil Khear Abdelmalak
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