Prepare for the iOS 11 update

Discover which of your apps won’t work in the next iOS – and replace them

After updating your iPhone or iPad to iOS 10.3, opening certain apps and games may have presented you with a warning that they need to be updated to

work with future versions of iOS. You can keep using them with iOS 10, but if you plan to upgrade to iOS 11 (expected to be released in the autumn), now is the time to take action for any apps you depend upon.

You need to find out which of your apps are affected. Expect many of them to be games, which you may still enjoy playing, but it’s more in the case of productivity apps that you should be concerned about; if you’re dependent on any of those apps and plan on using iOS 11, you’ll need to find replacements. For example, if you’ve got important documents prepped up, you don’t want to lose access to them.

There’s no need to laboriously open each app to discover which be definitively incompatible with the next iOS, though. In addition to the warning upon opening an app, iOS 10.3 can show you a list of all affected apps that are currently installed. Note, though, that it won’t tell you about apps you’ve deleted to make room for something else.

Redownload first

So, before following the steps below, and assuming your device has enough space, redownload apps you may want to use again: open the App Store and tap Updates followed by Purchased.

If you’ve disabled auto-downloading of apps in Settings > iTunes & App Stores on any of your devices, you’ll need to follow this tutorial on each device to be certain you aren’t overlooking an app that’s on your iPhone, say, but not your iPad.