Whenever Apple are in the process of releasing a new major update to iOS, it’s usually a messy situation for those running jailbroken devices. Users typically have to be careful with what they’re upgrading to, as it can be easy to lose backwards compatibility and end up stuck forever on an iOS version that will not be jailbroken.
It’s a similar case with iOS 9 and the transition to 10, as Pangu, one of the most prominent teams on the jailbreak scene, have announced that they plan to skip iOS 9.3.5 entirely, and will focus their efforts on iOS 10 instead.
This makes sense for them too, as the team would obviously want to get as much exposure as possible for their tools, making iOS 10 the obviously better option. Meanwhile, users who don’t want to upgrade to the next major version of iOS will still have the option of staying at 9.3.4, but they will also have to be extra careful to avoid accidentally upgrading to 9.3.5.
If that happens, the only option for a user would be to either upgrade to iOS 10, or forget about using jailbreak-based features on the device. Obviously neither is an ideal option for someone who prefers a more customizable version of iOS 9.
Some users are avoiding iOS 10 as it’s still new and they want to see some more updates for it before they make the switch. The current situation shouldn’t be a problem for them, as they can easily postpone the upgrade until the time is right.
Those who don’t want to move to iOS 10 for other reasons though, such as hardware incompatibility, will be out of luck in the situation described above. It’s possible that another team will tackle the task of developing a jailbreak tool for iOS 9.3.5, but the likelihood seems very slim right now.
After all, Pangu already had quite a lot of trouble cracking iOS 9.3.4, and it seems like any significant amount of effort invested in the cracking of 9.3.5 would be wasted in the long run. If someone manages to find a way to leverage the old tools for the new version of the operating system, that could change the story, but we don’t expect this to happen for various reasons.
Apple have been careful to make sure that they plug all security holes left over from the last update whenever they release a new version of iOS, even a minor one. Patching issues related to jailbreaking has been one of their main priorities, so we suspect that every opportunity to break the system that existed in iOS 9.3.4 would not have been carried over to the next version.
At least those who would accept an eventual upgrade to iOS 10 should be happy with the way things are going right now. Sooner or later there will be a stable, polished version of the operating system, complete with a jailbreak tool available for it.
All it usually takes in those situations is patience, and Apple’s fans who enjoy jailbreaking their devices must have developed a lot of it so far. It takes some time to get the next major release of a jailbreak tool, but in the end, the extra freedom provided by the procedure makes the wait more than worthwhile for most users.