Apple's shipment of iPadOS 18.6 to the public updates the current-gen iPad operating system, with the maintenance release fixing bugs while iPadOS 26 gets tested.

The release of iPadOS 18.6 arrives after three developer betas and one release candidate build.

In terms of content, it is an update with few actual material changes. During the betas, there were no observable alterations, indicating it to be an update that was more for maintenance than features.

Indeed, the release notes for the release candidate basically warned to developers that Health data became inaccessible when you reach the "slide to power off" page without a passcode.

Ultimately, the iPadOS 18.6 update is a bug fix and performance improvement release. It's one that users should install to maintain performance and security, if not to get new features to try out.

Apple releases the update to a backdrop of testing for iPadOS 26, the fall operating system release that introduces Liquid Glass for the user interface, more Apple Intelligence changes, and lots of productivity improvements.

How to install iPadOS 18.6

To install iPadOS 18.6 on an iPad manually, open the Settings app, select General, then Software Update. With beta updates turned off, the final release version will appear unless it has already been installed.

Not everyone needs to do this manually. It's only if a user has set their iPad not to automatically update.

Source: Appleinsider