iOS 8.3, iOS 9, OS X Beta Test Release Date Could Arrive In March 2015

By Dondi Tiples, Christian Post Contributor Monday, February 23, 2015

Apple is set to release a series of beta programs by March to test new iOS releases for bugs and glitches before officially launching them to consumers.

American consumer electronic multinational, Apple will be opening beta versions of their iOS 8.3 and iOS9 to selected volunteer guinea pigs, just as they did iOS X Yosemite in 2014.

The previous year, the company released its Mac OS X to the public in a beta testing program that gave a reported one million select participants access to Apple's Yosemite before its official release.

Pursuing a similar method to test for kinks and bugs in the system, these beta releases will act as a channel for Apple to gather pre-launch feedback from test participants possessing characteristics of their prime target market prior to full consumer launch.

With a strong MAC user population, the company has been sticking with its test-and-release method, and will reportedly do the same with the iOS 8.2, with another beta release round for iOS 9 this summer.

This technique makes sense for Apple, after being hit with heavy criticism for the buggy iOS 8 that bricked phones and messed up messaging and photo syncing for a number of iPhone users. With this new series of public beta testing, it's a win-win situation for the MAC maker to stop bugs in their tracks, while giving an extra large group of beta testers a good sneak preview of the new releases' features.

The public beta offer guarantees the software will be put through its full paces, upping the odds of detecting early problems and quashing them before handing them down to the general population. And as with all public betas, Apple will have the ready beta software excuse for any glitches beta testers encounter.

While Apple fielded an estimated one million testers for Yosemite, they are reportedly set to maintain "exclusivity" for the iOS testers, with only a lucky 100,000 beta test participants to be accepted this March.