Apple Seeds iOS 26 Public Beta for iPhone 11 Users

Apple today provided developers and public beta testers who have an iPhone 11 with a new beta of iOS 26. Apple did not seed the ‌iPhone‌ 11 version of the ‌iOS 26‌ public beta yesterday, but it's out now. The update has a build number of 23A5297n, which is different from the 23A5297m public beta that other testers received.

iOS 26 Feature
Public beta testers with an ‌iPhone‌ 11 can download the beta software using the Software Update section of the Settings app. Developers with an ‌iPhone‌ 11 will also see an update. Apple says that the beta fixes an issue that could cause an issue with the way that folders are displayed on the Home Screen.

Fixed: On iPhone 11, if you have organized apps into folders on your Home Screen, you might only see the leftmost column of the grid of apps when opening a folder. The other two columns in the folder do not display the app icons, preventing users from launching those apps

‌iOS 26‌ features Apple's new Liquid Glass design aesthetic, with a focus on translucency and glass-like interface elements. The design extends to the Lock Screen, ‌Home Screen‌, and Control Center, along with menus and buttons in apps.

Apple's software includes features for apps like Messages, Phone, Shortcuts, and Apple Music, along with new Apple Intelligence features, a revamp for CarPlay, and more.

For more on the features in ‌iOS 26‌, we have a dedicated iOS 26 roundup and a separate iPadOS 26 roundup. Several new features were found in beta 2 and we rounded them up, plus we did the same thing for beta 3 and beta 4.

The ‌iOS 26‌ beta is limited to developers and public beta testers, with a launch set for this fall.

Related Roundups: iOS 26, iPadOS 26
Related Forum: iOS 26

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Top Rated Comments

Peter_M Avatar
20 weeks ago
People with older iPhones should stay away from these newer iOS versions. The last time I updated the iOS on my iPhone 11, now the apps always have to refresh when I go between them, because of the higher memory demands of the newer iOS versions. That's a real hassle (going into my downloaded music in Spotify as one example).
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Maven1975 Avatar
20 weeks ago
I won’t be upgrading my 11. IOS 18 is bad enough on it.

Hard pass
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
G725 Avatar
20 weeks ago

People with older iPhones should stay away from these newer iOS versions. The last time I updated the iOS on my iPhone 11, now the apps always have to refresh when I go between them, because of the higher memory demands of the newer iOS versions. That's a real hassle (going into my downloaded music in Spotify as one example).
It's not that much better on the newer the newer iPhones. I can hardly have more than two Safari tabs stay open on my iPhone 16 Pro. Switching to other apps while filling out a form or something is also risky. I did enable Apple Intelligence though.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Reeneman Avatar
20 weeks ago
Welcome on the sweet beta train iPhone 11 user :)
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Wieslawo Avatar
19 weeks ago
It's fine on iPhone 11. Pretty smooth but also pretty ugly. I don't know how battery, coz my iP 11 is a music box connected to power but iOS 26 is doing just fine.
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
hovscorpion12 Avatar
20 weeks ago
IPhone 11 users rejoice!!
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)