App Store offering up older versions of iOS apps for some, leaves many unanswered questions

When iOS 7 hits tomorrow, app compatibility with older versions of iOS will become a thing again, though it looks as if Apple may be about to implement a solution for owners of older hardware. A Reddit thread has emerged, alerting us to some folks being offered a download of an older version of an app whose latest version requires a newer build of iOS.

Understandably, there's more than a few folks out there on the Internet that are getting extremely excited by this. But, there's no official confirmation on anything from Apple, and regardless of the official status, it leaves us with more questions than answers.

The first of those is whether or not it will remain turned on come September 18, when iOS 7 pushes out to millions of iOS devices all over the world. Since it's a server side function, at this point we have no idea if this will actually continue. Or how about, given the state of older applications, how well is this actually going to work? Older apps could be relying upon older API's, and if the older API's have gone away, what then happens to that app? Or app reviews; will a developers rating be affected by reviews for the most current version of an app somebody can use?

So, there's lots of reports of re-downloads for older versions, yet still tons of questions remain. If you try it out let me know if and how well it works for you!

Source: Reddit via Ryan Christensen

Richard Devine

Editor at iMore, part time racing driver, full time British guy. Follow him on Twitter and Google+