iOS 12 was released to the masses last week, so as per Apple’s tradition, we’re getting our first look at the next version of iOS 12 this week. Although decimal-point versions of iOS often aren’t the most exciting, Apple left out a few features from the iOS 12 initial release which have made an appearance in iOS 12.1. Yep, that means we’re talking about Group FaceTime.
Aside from the re-addition of Group FaceTime back to the beta, iOS 12.1 doesn’t bring any other notable changes. There is reportedly support in the code for Face ID in horizontal, but that may well be for a new iPad, not the current crop of iPhones.
Performance issues are, of course, the name of the game with beta versions of any software, but particularly iOS. Apple specifically warns people on the developer beta channel not to install the software on daily-driver devices — advice that people routinely ignore, of course, but you can’t blame Apple for not warning you!
If you’re not already on the public beta profile, you can hit this link on your iPhone or iPad and you’ll download the beta profile, which will let you install the iOS 12.1 public beta as an over-the-air update. If you prefer to do things the old-fashioned way, you can visit the link on your PC or Mac, and use iTunes to manually update. If you are already on the iOS 12.0 public beta profile, you should be seeing the iOS 12.1 beta as an over-the-air update right now.
The full list of compatible devices is below:
- iPhone X
- iPhone 8
- iPhone 8 Plus
- iPhone 7
- iPhone 7 Plus
- iPhone 6s
- iPhone 6s Plus
- iPhone 6
- iPhone 6 Plus
- iPhone SE
- iPhone 5s
- 12.9-inch iPad Pro 2nd generation
- 12.9-inch iPad Pro 1st generation
- 10.5-inch iPad Pro
- 9.7-inch iPad Pro
- 10.5-inch iPad
- iPad Air 2
- iPad Air
- iPad 5th generation
- iPad mini 4
- iPad mini 3
- iPad mini 2
- iPod touch 6th generation
