Resolved Transfer old iPhone backup to a newer iPhone?

[Morod]

Hey all, I’m not up much on iPhones. I currently have an iPhone7 with iOS15.8.5. I just bought an iPhone SE3, refurbished. It comes with iOS 14.
I am avoiding iOS 26 as much as I can. I back up my old iPhone to my Mac. Is there any way I can transfer the iPhone 7 backup to the new to me iPhone SE3?
Thanks for any help/advice!

 

[FreakinEurekan]

No, you can’t restore a backup to a version of iOS earlier than the one that made the backup.

 

[arw]

Yes, you can, but there's no guarantee that everything works as expected as the newer backup probably has parameters stored for features that are absent in older versions of iOS.
However, I have done so successfully with an iOS 18 backup of an iPhone 13 mini restored to an iPhones SE1 on iOS 15.

- Create a copy of your backup
- In the root folder of your backup open the Info.plist
- Find the <key>Product Version</key>
- Below, change <string>15.8.5</string> to the iOS 14 version of your SE3.
- Save the file

 

[Morod]

So now for the follow-up (and of course there's a follow-up)…
If I decide to put iOS 26 on the iPhone SE3, I can transfer my old iPhone 7 backup to the new phone? And, if so, how? Again, thanks!

 

[FreakinEurekan]

Yes, you can restore a backup from an older version to iOS 26. Just normal "Restore" during setup of the phone (if already set up, you'll use Erase All Contents & Settings to re-start the setup)