Apple just dropped iOS 26 Beta 7, and honestly, it’s a weird one. If you’ve been following the drama, you know that this version is basically the "pre-finish line" update. It’s the build that tells us exactly what the final version—the one everyone will download in September—is actually going to feel like.
The build number is 23A5326a. That little "a" at the end is a big deal in the dev world. It usually means Apple thinks the code is nearly baked. No more major overhauls. No more massive feature dumps. Just a lot of polishing and one very specific, very legal-sounding fix for the Apple Watch.
The Big Fix: Blood Oxygen is Back
The most important part of the iOS 26 beta 7 release notes isn't even on the phone itself. It’s about the watch on your wrist. For a couple of years now, Apple has been in a nasty legal fight with a company called Masimo. Because of that, if you bought an Apple Watch Series 9, Series 10, or Ultra 2 in the U.S. recently, your blood oxygen sensor was basically a paperweight.
Well, Beta 7 finally implements the workaround.
Apple found a way to re-enable the feature by moving the heavy lifting (the actual data processing) from the watch over to the iPhone. It’s a clever bit of software gymnastics. If you’re running this beta along with the watchOS 26 beta, that red light on the back of your watch might actually mean something again.
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Liquid Glass and Adaptive Power
Remember how Apple promised a "once in a decade" redesign with this "Liquid Glass" look? Some people love the translucency and the way icons seem to refract light. Others? Not so much. In Beta 7, the design is pretty much locked in. There aren't any big UI shifts here, which suggests Apple is confident in the blurry, glass-heavy aesthetic.
There is, however, a new toggle tucked away in the battery settings.
It’s called Adaptive Power Notifications.
Basically, iOS 26 has this new Adaptive Power Mode that isn’t as aggressive as the old Low Power Mode. It slows things down just enough to save juice without making your phone feel like a brick. In Beta 7, you can finally tell the phone to stop nagging you every time it kicks in. You’ve got the choice now: let it work in silence or get a ping when your performance is being throttled.
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The Boring (but Critical) Stuff
Beta 7 fixes a really annoying bug where screenshots would come out looking weirdly dark or over-saturated. If you’ve ever tried to share a meme and realized it looked like it was taken in a cave, this update is for you.
- Messages: There’s a new "Drafts" filter. If you’re like me and start ten texts but never finish them, you can finally find them without scrolling for an hour.
- Performance: Geekbench scores are showing that multi-core performance is finally stabilizing.
- Stability: This is the "snappiest" build yet. Apps open faster, and that weird stutter when swiping to the App Library is mostly gone.
But it's not all perfect. Some users on Reddit are still complaining that Bluetooth is acting up with car head units. And let's be real—battery life on a beta is always a roll of the dice. If you’re using an iPhone 16 Pro, you might notice the phone getting a bit warm during heavy use.
What This Means for the Public Release
Since we’re at the "a" build, the iOS 26 beta 7 release notes signify that we are likely only one or two weeks away from the Release Candidate (RC). If you’ve been holding off on the public beta because you were scared of bugs, this is probably the safest version to jump in on.
It’s stable enough for a daily driver, provided you don't mind the occasional app crash.
The focus has shifted from "what's new" to "what works." Apple is clearly focused on the integration of Google Gemini into Siri, which is the "Apple Intelligence" backbone for this year. While most of those features are still being "pre-warmed" in the code, Beta 7 lays the groundwork for the server-side switch that will happen later this fall.
If you are planning to install this, make sure you do a full iCloud backup first. Seriously. Don't be the person who loses three years of photos because a beta build decided to loop on the Apple logo.
Check your settings under General > Software Update. If you’re on the developer profile, it’s about an 800MB download. If you're coming from an older version, expect a massive 10GB chunk of data. Either way, get on a fast Wi-Fi connection and let it do its thing.