iOS 17.6 Beta 2: This Could Be Apple's Last Update Before iOS 18

Apple released the first iOS 17.6 beta to public beta testers on Tuesday, a day after the company released the beta to developers and almost a month after the company unveiled iOS 18 at WWDC 2024.

The second iOS 17.6 beta doesn’t appear to have any new features. But according to the second beta’s release notes, the update will likely squash a few bugs and patch some security issues when it’s released to the public.

We recommend downloading a beta only on something other than your primary device. Because this isn’t the final version of iOS 17.6, the update might be buggy and battery life may be short, and it’s best to keep those troubles on a secondary device.

Note that the beta is not the final version of iOS 17.6, so there could be more features to land on your iPhone when the update is released. There’s no word yet on when Apple will release iOS 17.6 to the public.

What’s in iOS 17.6 beta 2?

Not a whole lot of features from what I can tell, but that’s not that surprising for a few reasons.

The first is that everything Apple announced would be in iOS 17 has already been released. When the tech giant announced iOS 17 in 2023, it said it would bring a lot of features to your iPhone, like StandBy mode and the Journal app. While most of these features were available upon iOS 17’s release, a few were made available later. They’re all accounted for now, so there’s nothing we were specifically waiting for in a future update.

Also, when Apple released iOS 16.6 in July 2023 — the last major iOS 16 update prior to the release of iOS 17 — it was focused on bug fixes and security patches. They were still important fixes, but there were no new features in that update. The 17.6 patch will likely mirror 16.6 in function.

Lastly, Apple is gearing up for the release of iOS 18. The company already released the two developer betas for iOS 18 after announcing the next operating system at WWDC, and the public beta is set to be released this month. It’s unclear when it will be released to the general public, but I imagine Apple is shifting its focus from iOS 17 to make sure iOS 18 works well.

However, that doesn’t mean iOS 17.6 won’t have any new features. This is the second beta, and there will likely be more betas before the OS is released to the public, so there’s plenty of time for Apple to add things. As of now, though, there’s no word on when Apple will release iOS 17.6 to the general public.

For more on iOS 17, here’s what was included in iOS 17.5 and our iOS 17 cheat sheet. You can also check out what to know about iOS 18 so far and everything Apple announced at WWDC 2024.