macOS "Tahoe" 26.5 released: Is it time to upgrade from Sequoia? (poll)

[Populus]

Well, so far, so good. Everything I've tested seems as solid as Sequoia was. Frankly, I'm a bit shocked as I expected the opposite. Whatever Apple did from 26.2 until now has been good, at least for my 2020 Intel iMac. I'll report back if this whole thing goes south... hope not.

Congrats. Yeah, I have the impression that this year, the 26.5 version of Apple OSs has come out very polished.

 

[Miles Fu]

A year ago, my M4 MBP consumed about 20% of its battery during a one-hour Teams meeting. Now, it only drains around 7-8% per hour. macOS 15.7.x works incredibly well. Even though I installed macOS 26.5 on an external SSD capable of speeds over 2000 MB/s, it is still noticeably less smooth compared to 15.7.7. There is simply no reason for me to upgrade to Tahoe.

 

[throAU]

A year ago, my M4 MBP consumed about 20% of its battery during a one-hour Teams meeting. Now, it only drains around 7-8% per hour. macOS 15.7.x works incredibly well. Even though I installed macOS 26.5 on an external SSD capable of speeds over 2000 MB/s, it is still noticeably less smooth compared to 15.7.7. There is simply no reason for me to upgrade to Tahoe.

The 2GB/sec external SSD is about 1/2-1/3 the speed of the internal SSD and if it is USB needs CPU involvement.

 

[nmt1900]

One sidenote here - one can go and refresh own memory by reading forum's Sequoia threads. I had Apple Intelligence ruined my file system to the point where I had to wipe the system (purgeable data inconsistencies were behind that among other things).

Additionally I remember kernel panics from my own experience and just a week ago I was reviving the M1Pro MBP which was on 15.7.2 and was having frequent kernel panics and other crashes to the point where all attempts of system update lead to crashes. We wasted some time to diagnostics which came out clean, then made Time Machine backup, made DFU restore to 26.5 and restored the backup. It looks like that machine has not have any hiccups since then. I have not had kernel panics on Tahoe either.

Start of Tahoe was really rough, but somewhere around 26.3 it started to get things right (except that bricking bug of 26.4.x).

 

[ADGrant]

I am not a power user. Unless you are a Caveman like myself who is tuned into the Intel iMacs through long association, staying with Intel is, sadly, a lost cause. I agree with all those who hold back from OSX upgrading until the glitches are ironed out of an operating system and I would like to point out that each new OSX further restricts your working flexibility.

An Intel Mac running Tahoe has about two more years of support from Apple so not completely a lost cause yet.

 

[thadoggfather]

I finally made the leap about 10 minutes ago from Sonoma > macOS 26.5.

Initial impressions. The rounded corners are indeed bonkers. And I encountered a visual bug in settings where all the toggles in iCloud sync settings looked gray (and off) but were actually on. But a reload of that view fixed it. Hopefully just a one off.

It strangely rolled back istat menus to version 6 even though when I open the app it says version 7.3??? But I actually like the way I had things set up in version 6 better (I upgraded to ensure things would be compatible with Tahoe). Not sure if that will stick but I can't complain.

Scrolling feels smoother.

I am withholding my vote until I've had more time to evaluate. But so far so good.

Did you ever figure this out? I am also on istat menu 6 with Tahoe. I saw it shows v7 on my old Mac when I opened settings, but I have not opened it yet on my new Mac.

Debating paying to upgrade to 7, or holding out to see if there's a version 8 with Golden Gate coming. I just use a few stats on my menubar that I like not a hardcore iStat user.

Thanks

 

[avkills]

I am going to wait for os27 for my elgible machines. Mac Pro will stay with Sequoia.