As it usually does towards the final stretch of the beta season, Apple is moving to the weekly schedule of beta releases. Following Monday’s release of a new developer beta batch, the third round of public betas is rolling out now, including macOS 26 Tahoe beta 3. Here’s how to install it.
First things first: should you install the beta?
You probably know the drill: Betas can be unpredictably buggy. Even if something works on one release, it is not guaranteed to work on the next.
Of course, your mileage may vary. But if you decide to install the beta, strongly consider Apple’s advice to “install it on a secondary system or device, or on a secondary partition on your Mac”. Otherwise, make sure you back up your Mac before making the jump.
How to install macOS Tahoe 26 public beta 3
To install, the first thing you have to do is enroll in Apple’s public beta program at https://beta.apple.com/. Once you’re done, here’s the step-by-step:
Open System Settings
Go to General ⇾ Software Update
Click the ‘i’ icon next to Beta Updates
From the dropdown menu in the top-right, select the macOS Tahoe 26 Public Beta
Hit ‘Done’
What to expect from macOS Tahoe 26 public beta 3
If history is any indication, today’s public beta is the same build as yesterday’s developer beta 6. That means you’ll get a few new system icons, including the new Macintosh HD, which dropped the illustration of a classic spinning hard disk drive in favor of a more modern SSD.
Aside from that, Apple seems to have taken this release to work on under-the-hood improvements and bug fixes, rather than bring more user-facing changes, like it did on iOS 26 developer beta 5.
macOS Tahore 26 brings the new Liquid Glass look, desktop widgets, a more customizable control center, iPhone Live Activities on the menu bar thanks to Continuity, a new and more powerful Spotlight, and much more.
For a recap of 9to5Mac’s public beta previews, check out these stories:
Are you running the public beta? What has your experience been like? Let us know in the comments.
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