Apple releases iOS 11.2.5 with HomePod support, minor macOS, tvOS, and watchOS updates

After a five-week beta period, Apple today released iOS 11.2.5, macOS 10.13.3, tvOS 11.2.5, and watchOS 4.2.2 to the general public. Each of the new operating system releases includes bug fixes and stability improvements, following Apple’s rush to address Spectre and Meltdown processor vulnerabilities in an earlier point-point release.

iOS 11.2.5 includes support for the upcoming HomePod speaker, allows Siri to read the news in three HomePod countries, and addresses “ChaiOS,” a malicious text message link that can crash iOS without being clicked. macOS 10.13.3 fixes a Messages bug that can display incoming messages out of order, as well as a security bug that allows the System Preferences’ App Store menu to be unlocked with any password. No user-facing changes apart from bug fixes were noticed in either tvOS 11.2.5 or watchOS 4.2.2.

As the releases propagate across Apple’s servers, they will be available to download directly from iPhones, iPads, iPod touches, Macs, and Apple TVs, with the Apple Watch update available through the iPhone’s Watch app. iOS and tvOS releases will also be available through iTunes.

As of last week, Apple said that iOS 11 had already been installed on 65 percent of devices, down significantly from iOS 10’s and iOS 9’s roughly 76 percent footprints four months after their respective releases. The 11 percent difference could be explained by a higher number of devices unable to upgrade to the current version, a larger pool of devices overall with fewer in new OS-critical uses, or users holding off on upgrading to iOS 11 because of something they don’t like. Currently, 28 percent of devices remain on iOS 10, and 7 percent are on iOS 9 or earlier releases.