Apple

10 Things to Do Before Installing iOS 14 Beta

Published

4 years ago

09/11/2020

If you decide to install the iOS 14 beta on your iPhone you’ll want to spend some time preparing yourself, and your device, for the move.

The official version of iOS 14 arrives in the fall, but if you don’t want to wait you can try an early version of the new operating system right now.

The company’s put iOS 14 into beta testing ahead of its official release. The iOS 14 beta is available to those with a developer account and those enrolled in the Beta Software Program.

Installing iOS 14 right now is extremely tempting. The software has a bunch of interesting changes on board including Widgets on the Home Screen, improvements to Messages, and a whole lot more.

While some of you might want to wait for the company to fix some of the beta’s ongoing problems, others might want to jump in right now.

If you choose to take the plunge, you’ll want to be careful. This is pre-release software and it’s plagued with a variety of bugs and performance issues. These problems could have a noticeable impact on your day-to-day use.

You can’t predict the exact list of problems you’ll encounter so it’s important to prepare. This is especially important if this is your first time installing an iOS beta.

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To assist you, we’ve put together a pre-installation guide that will walk you through all of the steps we normally take before we install iOS beta software.

This might take around 10 minutes for some of you. Others might need 30 minutes or longer. While this might seem tedious, these steps will help you avoid major headaches today and down the road.

Backup Your Data

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If you don't have a whole lot of time to commit to the pre-installation process, make sure you take this step at the very least.

Data loss issues are fairly rare these days, but there's always a chance something goes wrong. If you store sensitive data on your device, you'll want to make sure everything is backed up before you move your device to the iOS 14 beta.

You can backup your data via Apple's iCloud service or you can do it on your Mac via Finder (if you're running macOS Catalina) or iTunes if you're running an older version of macOS or using a Windows computer.

If you store a ton of data on your iPhone this process could take awhile so you'll need to remain patient.