Resetting iPhone Encrypted Backup Password

[Rod]

Did you forget your iPhone backup encryption password? I seems I did, or at least the one I had was incorrect.

I wanted to upgrade my iPhone iOS to the current Beta version. From iOS 14 to iOS 15 beta 8. Naturally I wanted to backup my iPhone first but my backups were all encrypted. This was not a problem in itself unless I needed to use a local backup to restore the iPhone to iOS 14. At that point I would need the password and I now knew the password I had was not correct.

I decided to face the consequences of Resetting All Settings but first I checked the Apple Community Forum just to make sure I had the process right. see; "If you can't remember........" on this page. About encrypted backups on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch

Note that in step 3 of the above it states, " it will reset settings like display brightness, Home screen layout, and wallpaper." as well as the encryption password.

This was the bit I was dreading, resetting my home screen layout. I had to do this once before for a different reason and the Home Screen reverted to an alphabetic list of native apps and all my folders of third party apps were gone. As you can imagine it took a while to recreate the layout as it had been.

But it didn't happen. After Resetting All Settings only my Lock Screen image changed, everything else remained the same on my Home Screen. Of course all my WiFi settings were gone and my Location and Notification settings but resetting them is not a bad thing anyway. It also deletes the device name, returning it to "iPhone".

Maybe this is a change in iOS 14, I cannot say but if it is it's a good one. Returning my iPhone to its original state took almost no time at all. Yes, I did have to set up Apple Pay again but the previous card I used was remembered and I had the option to use the same card again just be adding the 3 digit number on the back.

After the above I did a new encrypted backup to my MBP and proceeded to the upgrade. This time I put the password in my password manager.

To sum up, if you must Reset All Settings it's nowhere near as daunting as it used to be.

 

[Rod]

An unexpected benifit of the above proceedure has been part resetting my preferences, at least I think that's the reason. My battery consumption has reduced noticeably. This is the exact opposite of what many users report after an upgrade so I'm accrediting it to the Reset All Settings which has forced me to give permission to apps that use Location services and background functions.