Which iPhone do you have? Will it be compatible with the next operating software, iOS 26 when it’s revealed on Monday, June 9 at WWDC? (In case you haven’t heard, Apple is thought to jump from the current iPhone software, iOS 18 to iOS 26 — read full details of why here.) Read on for the list of iPhones that it’s thought will drop off the update rota this year.
Apple will reveal the detail on Monday, but the new OS won’t launch on general release until the fall. Developer betas will start being issued from Monday, with public betas expected from July.
When Apple made the same announcement last June, it turned out that every iPhone that was compatible with 2023’s iOS 17 release was also able to run iOS 18.
It’s pretty rare for that state of affairs to happen more than two years in a row, however.
The latest rumors suggest that there will be three iPhones that won’t cut the mustard, and these are the three oldest models which can run iOS 18, all of which went on sale for the first time in 2018.
These are the iPhone XS, the larger iPhone XS Max and the more affordable iPhone XR, all of which are powered by the Apple A12 Bionic chip.
That means that all iPhones from the iPhone 11 onwards will work with iOS 26 — if you have an iPhone 11 or later, you can relax.
It’s important to stress that if you have one of these iPhones it won’t cease to work come the fall. Nothing will change except the iOS 26 updates won’t work on them.
But there will still be iOS 18 updates to come, largely security updates. However, it’s unlikely any new features will be added to the phones beyond what they can already do.
Concerted rumors say that iOS 26 will have a radically different design. The iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max and iPhone XR won’t get to see any of that.
