Downgrading from Ventura

[Nikolajovic]

Hello there,
I am trying to downgrade from Ventura back to Monterey on an M1 MacBook pro, but it doesn't seem to be possible without having another Mac. Is this really the case or I'm doing something wrong?

First of all I want to specify that I don't mind having to wipe the device completely and lose any data currently on it. I don't have a time machine backup, it's a secondary device primarily meant for betas.
What I assume is necessary now is to create a bootable USB drive with Mac OS Monterey. However, the main problem here is that when I go to Appstore to download Monterey, and press the get button, all it does is open up software update, nicely tells me that there are no updates because logically there aren't, and nothing else happens.
Is there a way to make it realize that I am trying to download an older installer on purpose and successfully do so?

Thanks.

 

[ssn637]

You can revert back to macOS Monterey by downloading its installer here

macOS Monterey Full Installer

After creating a USB Flash Drive installation media you will need to erase the current partition with Disk Utility following a restart after selecting the macOS Monterey option. I was able to successfully downgrade from macOS Ventura Beta via this method. As far as I can remember, if you simply restart in Recovery mode, erase the hard drive using Disk Utility from there and again restart into Recovery Mode, you will also be able to reinstall macOS Monterey via the download method without the need for a USB flash disk, but this will take longer.

 

[Nikolajovic]

Thank you.
I was also thinking you should be able to wipe the drive from the recovery and reinstall Monterey that way, but I wasn't sure if this would just reinstall Ventura instead, which would be a waste of time.
Anyway the download link works, so thanks once again.

 

[Mike Boreham]

Yes you should be able to downgrade to Monterey from Recovery or bootable USB but you will still have Ventura firmware, which shouldn't matter. If using Recovery you need to use Internet Recovery as Here to get Monterey. If you want to completely roll back including firmware you will need to use Apple Configurator 2 which requires a second Mac.

 

[haralds]

Recovery installs the latest RELEASE version of macOS, which currently is 12.4.

 

[Stefdar]

Recovery installs the latest RELEASE version of macOS, which currently is 12.4.

Not without restoring through Apple Configurator it doesn't.

 

[antmit]

Is it possible to downgrade to a previous beta version? ie 2 back to 1? My laptop seems to be going quite slowly between apps and beta 1 was fine. I'd like to go back to it if possible, but am supposing it's not possible?

 

[Mike Boreham]

Is it possible to downgrade to a previous beta version? ie 2 back to 1? My laptop seems to be going quite slowly between apps and beta 1 was fine. I'd like to go back to it if possible, but am supposing it's not possible?

If you have the full installer for the previous beta you can make a bootable installer and install from that.

Previous betas are sometimes available from the Apple catalogs. The free MDS is the easiest way of seeing and downloading (and making bootable installer)...IMHO

 

[antmit]

If you have the full installer for the previous beta you can make a bootable installer and install from that.

Previous betas are sometimes available from the Apple catalogs. The free MDS is the easiest way of seeing and downloading (and making bootable installer)...IMHO

Thanks! Would that still mean installing fresh, or would it allow you to keep apps and docs?

 

[Mike Boreham]

Thanks! Would that still mean installing fresh, or would it allow you to keep apps and docs?

You could erase/install then migrate from a TM backup or clone.

EDIT you might need to select a TM backup from before the macOS update...not sure.

 

[markgpearse]

I tried all kinds of different ways suggested on different sites. The only one that worked was using disk utility to wipe my hard drive clean and then install Monterey and then use my last Time Machine Monterey back up. While in Ventura, I couldn't use TM to go back and I couldn't download Monterey.