Paul Morris·

iOS 11.1 Public Beta 5 Download Not Installing? You’re Not Alone

Apple has seemingly been doing a wonderful job of doing of getting iOS 11.1 into a position where it can be released to the public and come pre-installed on iPhone X ahead of the device’s November 3rd release. Multiple developer and public-facing betas have been pumped out in order to gain feedback and get the platform in a position where the company is comfortable to release globally, most of which have come without issue.

However, multiple public testers are now taking to social media and forums to suggest that the latest iOS 11.1 public beta 5 release is failing to install, and is causing issues for them.

This is particularly interesting for a number of reasons. First of all, Apple has thus far managed to have a seamless iOS 11.1 beta period which has involved rolling out multiple versions to registered developers and public testers. All of those versions have so far managed to get issued from the company’s Cupertino campus without any major issue being experienced or reported. Secondly, the iOS 11.1 public beta 5 is essentially the exact same build of iOS which was issued to developers as developer beta 5, just from a different development branch. The issue wasn’t experienced on that release, which suggests that the problem is meta-data or server-side rather than an internal issue with Apple’s code.

Those who have been experiencing the issue have been reporting that it happens on all device types, iPhone and iPad, and puts them in a position where the fifth public beta of iOS 11.1 just fails to install after downloading. Some of those users have reported that they go through the usual process of trying to install public beta 5 from the iOS update notification and that the device appears to be updating as normal, but when the process completes and access to the device is granted back, the device is still running public beta 4 and the public beta 5 notification is still active and available through the Software Update mechanism.

The information coming from affected users is somewhat of a mixed bag though. Some are reporting that patience is the key to success and that perseverance eventually got public beta 5 onto their device. Some are suggesting that removing the beta configuration profile and reinstalling was their route to success.

There are also success stories courtesy of a hard reboot of the iOS device, followed by retrying the update.  For hard rebooting the iPhone X/8/7, check out our guide here, or and here. Pre-iPhone 7 users can check out our guide here.

If everything is working fine for you then class yourself amongst the lucky ones. If not, it could be a case of waiting for Apple to resolve.

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