Following the release of iOS 14.3 yesterday, Apple surprised by releasing iOS 12.5. Yes, you read that correctly and that is that the iPhone operating system between 2018 and 2019 came back to life to integrate important news in devices that today could no longer update their software. Here we tell you all the details about it.
For those who cannot have iOS 13 and iOS 14
Although the current version of the iPhone software is compatible with the same phones as last year’s system, the same is not the case with iOS 12. That version was one of the most stable in memory, although it did not include very new features. notable that have left an important mark. However, it served so that some devices with a few updates behind them could end their support via software. All that was until yesterday when the aforementioned iOS 12.5 was released.
The devices compatible with this version are the iPhone 5s, iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus . These three, despite the arrival of new generations, are still the main phone for thousands of users around the world. This is what motivated Apple to launch this version of software specially focused on allowing these devices to enable notifications of exposure to COVID-19 with the respective apps enabled by each country. In fact, we already saw something similar a few months ago when a special version of iOS 13 was launched to activate this function while waiting for iOS 14 to finish its beta version stage. It should be noted that no more news is included in this version for old iPhone.
Apple returns to surprise with ‘vintage’ updates
One of the advantages that are always exposed of iOS versus Android is that Apple’s software is usually longer-lived and guarantees that a terminal of the brand has updates for at least 4 years, although it is already becoming a standard to find up to 5 years on some models. However, it is really surprising to see how even after years of outdated, some iPhones can receive updates at some point. This happened last year with the iPhone 4s, phones that had not been updated since 2016 and that received security patches.
The old iPhone updates are not really common, but they are occasional and it is at least curious. This is Apple’s way of ensuring that no one is left behind and that if a very big security problem arises they will have it resolved. And in cases such as iOS 12.5, it becomes more important if we consider that the objective is to be able to provide them with very useful functionality in times as difficult as those we live around the COVID-19 pandemic.