You have a new iPhone or iPad—congratulations! When transferring your data to the new device, you have three options: Quick Start, an iCloud backup, or a Mac backup. All will work, but they don’t quite provide the same end result (particularly if you didn’t encrypt your Mac backup). My advice—backed by this post from Apple expert John Gruber—is to try Quick Start first because it transfers everything directly from your old device to your new one, maintaining app logins in most cases and allowing you to transfer your Apple Watch pairing. It tells you that this may take a little longer, but it’s taking longer because it’s transferring more, and not relying on iCloud.
To use Quick Start, be sure that your old device is running at least iOS 11 (it is if you updated your device in the past four years) and has Bluetooth turned on. Just follow Apple’s instructions in the link above.
(Featured image by Adam Engst)