macOS Tahoe 26.5 Release Candidate Now Available

Monday May 4, 2026 10:14 am PDT by Juli Clover

Apple today provided the release candidate version of an upcoming macOS Tahoe 26.5 update to developers for testing purposes, with the update coming a week after Apple seeded the fourth beta.

Developers can download the ‌macOS Tahoe‌ 26.5 update by opening up the System Settings app, selecting the General category, and then choosing Software Update. Beta Updates will need to be enabled, and a free developer account is required.

No new features were found in the first four ‌macOS Tahoe‌ 26.5 betas, and it's likely the update primarily focuses on bug fixes and performance improvements.

Related Roundup: macOS Tahoe

Related Forum: macOS Tahoe

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Top Rated Comments

jclo

27 weeks ago

Ik it's fixed but come on

This was up for like a minute before I fixed it. I'm soooooo glad it's immortalized! I'm just going to blame the fact that it's a Monday and ask for forgiveness.

If anyone wants a longer explanation: After there is a beta, I usually get the next post ready to go so we are prepared for the following beta or RC. Last week, I was working from the airport, and when I did the fourth beta post, I didn't get another beta post ready. I then ignored the 3/29 reminder I wrote myself to prepare new beta posts. So when the macOS Tahoe RC came up, I was unprepared. I opened up Byword where I keep my drafts so I could copy the install/feature info quick and get the RC article up in a timely manner. Except I searched for macOS Tahoe 26.4 instead of macOS Tahoe 26.5 and grabbed the text from the wrong article. It's pretty rare I don't have these ready early and I'm usually not in a rush, so hopefully it won't happen again.

I hope the rest of you are having a better Monday!

Score: 22 Votes (Like | Disagree)

roncron

27 weeks ago

This was up for like a minute before I fixed it. I'm soooooo glad it's immortalized! I'm just going to blame the fact that it's a Monday and ask for forgiveness.

If anyone wants a longer explanation: After there is a beta, I usually get the next post ready to go so we are prepared for the following beta or RC. Last week, I was working from the airport, and when I did the fourth beta post, I didn't get another beta post ready. I then ignored the 3/29 reminder I wrote myself to prepare new beta posts. So when the macOS Tahoe RC came up, I was unprepared. I opened up Byword where I keep my drafts so I could copy the install/feature info quick and get the RC article up in a timely manner. Except I searched for macOS Tahoe 26.4 instead of macOS Tahoe 26.5 and grabbed the text from the wrong article. It's pretty rare I don't have these ready early and I'm usually not in a rush, so hopefully it won't happen again.

I hope the rest of you are having a better Monday!

You're human, everyone makes mistakes. Macrumors' error rate is super tiny compared to many others, including myself. I get a lot of value from Macrumors, I'll most of us here feel the same.

Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)

jclo

27 weeks ago

You're human, everyone makes mistakes. Macrumors' error rate is super tiny compared to many others, including myself. I get a lot of value from Macrumors, I'll most of us here feel the same.

Written by humans, for humans. I bet ChatGPT wishes it could make errors like I can!

Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Lounge vibes 05

27 weeks ago

Kind of a strange significant thing, this will likely be the last RC/version of macOS to include literally any user facing changes to run on Intel computers.
Of course there will be a 26.6 in July and a 26.7 in September and even likely a 26.8 next year but those are almost always exclusively security update fixes.
This is the last time Intel Macs are receiving the latest available update beta or otherwise that all other Macs are receiving.
For reference the last time this happened was Leopard 10.5.8 in August 2009, released just a couple weeks before snow leopard. I don’t really count the SL betas the way I do now because they weren’t exactly a click away, you had to have access to the install DVD.
Curiously both Tahoe and Leopard, the last operating system to run on Intel and PowerPC respectively, were both not exactly warmly received UI refreshes that were/likely will be followed by massive cleanup releases with the following update.

Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)