Apple released the second public beta of iOS 26.1 on Tuesday, less than a month after the company released iOS 26, which introduced Liquid Glass, call screening and more to your device.
iOS 26.1 brings a useful security feature to developers’ and beta testers’ devices, which I hope will make the final cut.
Since this is a beta, I recommend downloading it only on something other than your primary device. The update might be buggy, and battery life may be short.
Also, given that it’s not the final version, more features could land on your iPhone when 26.1 is released. There’s no word on when Apple will release iOS 26.1 to the general public.
Here are the features developers and beta testers can try now, and what could be on your iPhone when Apple officially releases iOS 26.1.
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Automatically install security improvements
Apple introduces a useful new security setting in the iOS 26.1 beta that allows your iPhone to download and install security improvements on its own.
“Background Security Improvements provide additional protection to your iPhone in between software updates,” according to Apple. “In rare instances of compatibility issues, these security improvements may be temporarily removed and then enhanced in a future software update.”
This feature reminds me of Apple’s Rapid Security Responses (RSR). The company introduced RSRs in 2023 as a way to quickly deploy security fixes to devices. While a good idea in theory, Apple hasn’t used iOS RSRs since the release of iOS 16.5.1 (c) in July 2023.
This isn’t a flashy setting, but it’s useful and allows you to stay up to date on smaller security updates without doing any extra work. Once enabled, this setting takes care of the rest, so you don’t have to check your iPhone every day for new updates to potential security issues.
Changing songs in Apple Music
Apple Music got a handful of new features in iOS 26, but the iOS 26.1 beta doesn’t change much about the app or service. Instead, the update lets you change songs in a new way.
With the iOS 26.1 beta, instead of tapping the next or backward buttons to change songs, you can swipe left or right on the song title from the music player within Apple Music. You can do this when the player is taking up your whole screen or when you’re looking through Apple Music and the player is small and near the bottom of your screen. The song title even appears to jump left or right when you change songs now, too.
Alarm gets another update
One of my favorite small upgrades in iOS 26 was the ability to change your alarm snooze length. In the iOS 26.1 beta, Apple makes it harder to accidentally dismiss your alarm. When your alarm goes off in the beta, you now have to swipe to stop it rather than hit a button. This could be annoying if you’re trying to shut your alarm off fast, or it could help ensure you’re actually awake before you turn your alarm off.
More Live Translation languages
The iOS 26.1 beta adds more languages to the new Live Translation feature. Apple introduced this feature to iPhones and AirPods with iOS 26, and the beta lets developers and beta testers use it with these languages.
- Chinese (Mandarin, simplified)
- Chinese (Mandarin, traditional)
- Italian
- Japanese
- Korean
Apple Intelligence in more languages
If you have an Apple Intelligence-enabled iPhone, iOS 26.1 beta 1 brings the AI features to these languages.
- Chinese (traditional)
- Danish
- Dutch
- Norwegian
- Portuguese (Portugal)
- Swedish
- Turkish
- Vietnamese
Calendar update
Not a major change, but the iOS 26 beta updates the Calendar interface. If you view your calendar in List View, any calendar events you have on a specific day will be colored across the whole bottom part of your screen.
New video scrubbing bar
The iOS 26.1 beta also brings a small change to the video scrubbing bar in Photos. If you go into Photos and watch a video, you’ll notice that the bar across the bottom of your screen is more compact and inline compared to the past scrubbing bar, which had the play/pause and volume buttons above the bar.
This is another small change that you might not have even noticed.
Those are a few of the new features developers and public beta testers can try with the second public beta of iOS 26.1. There will likely be more betas before the OS is released to the public, so there’s plenty of time for Apple to change these features.
For more iOS news, here’s my review of the iOS 26, how to reduce the Liquid Glass effects in the update and how text screening works in the update. You can also check out our iOS 26 cheat sheet.
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