Can iTunes 12.9.4.104 back up an iPhone 4s that's running iOS 5?

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Can iTunes 12.9.4.104 back up an iPhone 4s that's running iOS 5?

I'm giving an iPhone SE to a friend who currently has an iPhone 4S. The SE has been updated to iOS 12.2. As far as I know, the 4S has never been updated and is running the iOS version it shipped with (version 5?).

I would like to use iTunes to back up the data on the 4S and restore it to the SE. I have iTunes 12.9.4.104 running on Windows 10. My question is about backward compatibility. Can the current version of iTunes back up a device running such an old version of iOS?

I can't be 100% certain about which iOS version is installed on the 4S because my friend lives out of town and I won't have my hands on the phone for another week. Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I don't have an iCloud account so that's not an option for me.

iPhone 4S

Posted on May 6, 2019 11:47 PM

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Answer 1

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turingtest2

Level 10

272,821 points

May 7, 2019 3:10 AM in response to beagle79

In principle iTunes can back up all versions of iOS that were released up until the point that version of iTunes was released. In principle an iOS device backup can be restored to any compatible device running the same or better version of iOS as that which was backed up. How this works in practice with such a large jump might be a different matter.

tt2

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Answer 2

beagle79 Author

Level 1

8 points

May 8, 2019 10:56 PM in response to turingtest2

Thanks, tt2. I thought there might be someone out there who had already tried such a big jump. It looks like I'll just have to give it a try and see what happens.

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Answer 3

turingtest2

Level 10

272,821 points

May 9, 2019 4:05 AM in response to beagle79

You're welcome. Best of luck. 🙂

tt2

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Can iTunes 12.9.4.104 back up an iPhone 4s that's running iOS 5?

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