If, after initiating the iOS 18 download, your iPhone is stuck in the ‘preparing update’ stage, don’t panic – it can sometimes take up to an hour for major iOS updates to begin installing. The good news is that you can still use your iPhone as normal while this preparation (and the eventual download) occurs in the background; just be mindful that your phone may suddenly reboot itself while you’re in the middle of an iMessage conversation.
If, however, your iOS 18 download hasn’t started after an hour or more, you can restart the download process. To do this, go to Settings > General > iPhone storage, then scroll to the bottom of the page. You should see an iOS 18 file – tap on it, then hit ‘Delete Update’.
At this point, you can restart the iOS 18 install process, ensuring that you’ve followed all of the troubleshooting steps above.
