How To Downgrade iOS 11.2.6 On iPhone, iPad, iPod touch

Here’s how you can downgrade iOS 11.2.6 to iOS 11.2.5 on your compatible iPhone, iPad or iPod touch device.

As you may already know by now, Apple released iOS 11.2.6 today to patch a critical bug which made messaging apps such as WhatsApp, iMessage and many others crash when a specific character from Indian language Telugu was sent to devices running iOS 11.2.5 or below.

While iOS 11.2.6 is an important update for those affected by this issue, but if you upgraded and then immediately noticed issues such as poor battery life or performance, then here’s how you can go back to iOS 11.2.5. It’s important to note that you can only downgrade back to iOS 11.2.5 from iOS 11.2.6 as iOS 11.2.5 is the only firmware being signed by Apple besides iOS 11.2.6 and iOS 11.3 betas.

Also important to note here is that downgrading from iOS 11.2.6 to iOS 11.2.5 won’t give you any jailbreak benefits as iOS 11.2.5 doesn’t have any jailbreak available for it. With that out of the way, here’s how you can rollback iOS 11.2.6.

Note: Complete backups made via iTunes or iCloud on iOS 11.2.6 won’t be restorable on iOS 11.2.5 as backups aren’t backwards compatible.

Step 1: Download iOS 11.2.5 from here.

Step 2: Disable Find My iPhone on your device from Settings > iCloud > Find My iPhone.

Step 3: Launch iTunes and put your device into DFU or Recovery Mode by following the instructions given in the links below depending on the type of device you have:

Those of you having devices older than the ones linked/mentioned above, follow the instructions here.

Step 4: Once in DFU mode, hold down the Option key on the Mac keyboard and click on the Restore iPhone… button. Those of you on Windows can do same by holding down Shift key while clicking on Restore iPhone… button. Once prompted, select the iOS 11.2.5 IPSW file.

That’s about it. Allow iTunes to go through the restore process. Once complete, you should have your device downgraded back to iOS 11.2.5.

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