iOS 16 beta testers have now waited longer for the fourth developer beta version than any new full iOS release since iOS 6 and iOS 7.
The minor landmark, highlighted on Reddit, was hit when Apple did not release the fourth beta version of iOS 16 yesterday. In 2012 and 2013, both iOS 6 and iOS 7's betas were in their third version for 21 days, the same as iOS 16's third developer beta as of today.
If the fourth beta version of iOS 16 is not released later today, iOS 16's third beta version will become the longest ever ".0" third beta of its kind. Regardless of exactly when the fourth beta version is seeded to developers and public beta testers, it is highly likely to occur sometime this week.
Most indications suggest that the development of iOS 16 has not been quite as smooth as recent years, with beta releases often not conforming to the patterns that have come to be expected of Apple based on previous years. Earlier this year, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman speculated that the beta versions could be running behind since internal seeds are currently a "bit buggy."
As rumored, iOS 16's public beta version was late this year. iOS 16's public beta became available on July 11, over two weeks later than the equivalent timeframe for iOS 15's first public beta last year.
Initial betas are often riddled with bugs that need to be fixed, which is why Apple goes through a months-long beta testing period before the updates are officially released to all device owners in September. Apple often recommends beta testers run the new software on a secondary device due to these issues.
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1. The fact that I’ve read this article
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It’s a slow day for everyone involved…
Apple releasing DB3 as PB1 makes more sense to me, both as a developer and a user. It also happened within the first half of July which aligns with what Apple promised.
The major issues I have been experiencing are with Safari on macOS Ventura and the Music app (which is already better in Beta 3) on macOS , but these two apps have always had ton of bugs and stability issues on macOS for me.
With that said, I am pretty happy with the beta releases of the new major updates this year and I think Apple is defo doing much better software quality wise, compared to the last year.
Which doesn't mean I'm not hoping for Beta 4! ?
Hopefully, today is the day we see a new beta being released. Fingers are crossed. ??
Now that I say this, Beta 4/Public Beta 2 is probably going to break more stuff and make me eat my words. ?